First Try: Team Tetsuo
by Lucillia
Summary: Kakashi was a bit late to fill out a bit of paperwork, and as a result, Tetsuo manages to keep his student and gain that year's Rookie of the Year and Top Kunoichi. With what he sees as a potential dream team, or at least one that won't drag Naruto down, he decides to prepare them for the Winter Chunin Exams that are coming up in two months. Diverges from First Try Chapter 11.
1. The Results of Kakashi's Tardiness

It was a well known fact that Kakashi was always late, and would put anything that wasn't vital to the successful completion of his mission off until the last minute, and sometimes beyond the last minute. In one timeline, the thing Kakashi put off beyond the last minute was a certain conversation with the Hokage. While Kakashi stalled, Shimura Tetsuo turned in a number of properly filled out forms that had been done in triplicate. As a result, Hatake Kakashi ended up being out one Genin team while Shimura Tetsuo happily noted that he'd gotten that year's Rookie of the Year, and Top Kunoichi, which meant that Naruto's new teammates wouldn't slow him down too much, and derail his progress, as he wouldn't be forced to focus on his new students to the detriment of Naruto.

Normally, with a pair of fresh out of the Academy students on the team, it would have been a pity about the Chunin Exams in Suna in January but, if he played his cards right, that wouldn't be too much of a problem. He was reasonably certain that with an intensive training regime, he would get the two new students up to scratch in time to at least put in a reasonably good showing that, with Naruto's help and experience, would allow them to reach the Third Phase where Naruto would get the chance he'd been robbed of over the summer. The Uchiha and the Haruno were the top two students of the year after-all, and because of that, he was reasonably certain that he might be able to secure a special dispensation from the Hokage to allow them to participate in the Exams which would be taking place in a little more than two months if he could prove that the two of them were ready in time. There was no question about Naruto's readiness, people in the village were already saying that Naruto would already be a Chunin if it weren't for the fact that the last Exam had taken place in Iwa.

With that in mind, he studied the files of his new students with the intention of custom planning a training routine for his team in order to get them into shape and fast. He would have barely two months in which to work with them in order to get them ready in time, as well as complete the eight required missions that were necessary for consideration as a candidate for the Exams. He had vowed that Naruto wouldn't miss another Chunin Exam, and had no intention of going back on that promise...

* * *

Naruto sighed as he slunk through the Hokage tower and silently made his way towards the Hokage's private office to deliver his "Thank You" note to the Hokage for giving him Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura as teammates. Of all of the students in the Academy, it just had to be those two. Honestly, the only way it could have been worse would have been if the Old Man had stuck that little backstabber Hibachi who'd nearly gotten him killed when he was eight on the team instead of Sakura. Initially, he hadn't planned on actually delivering the note which he'd written out as a form of anger management therapy that had been taught to him by Morishita-san, but he'd been wandering by the tower during his walk through the village, noticed that Konohamaru's window was open yet again, and figured that since he had the note in his pocket...

As he made his way down to the private office/study that had belonged to four Hokages (the Old Man twice), mentally grumbling and muttering uncomplimentary things about the Old Man the entire way, he heard a noise coming from the scroll storage vault and decided to investigate as he'd just heard the Hokage's private toilet flush, which meant that it wasn't the Old Man visiting the vault because he couldn't sleep.

As it turned out, the intruder in the scroll vault was a Chunin who worked at the Academy who had decided to turn Missing-nin that evening, and had been hoping to steal a very important Jutsu scroll to give to the leader of the village he'd decided to join in hopes of earning a higher rank than the one he held in Konoha. The moron obviously had no business teaching if this was any example of his critical thinking skills, and he'd hate to meet any students he turned out. Unfortunately, two of them, two who happened to be near the top of his list of least favorite people in Konoha in fact, were going to be on his team.

All he could think after he'd incapacitated and captured Mizuki was _Seriously?_

When he'd caught the man in the vault, the bastard had tried to bribe him with and empty promise of power and vengeance. Whats worse, the man had honestly expected him to betray Konoha because he'd had a demon sealed in his gut rather than something useful like a super cool sword, a demon which the Old Man had subsequently informed him had been sealed into his mother, and the Shodai Hokage's wife before her in order to keep Konoha safe, and to keep the Kyuubi out of enemy hands. It was a pity that there were a large number of people out there that were too stupid to separate the jailor from that which he imprisoned, but he could understand some of the wariness people had of him, considering what happened when he'd lost it, and what could happen if he lost it in Konoha for instance. Just because there were scads of blind idiots surrounding him was no reason to betray the village that his mother had trusted him to protect, the village his mother had died protecting. Besides, almost all of his precious people were here, and he couldn't protect them if he betrayed Konoha.

As it was, he may have been a bit harsher than usual as he restrained Mizuki and held him until the Hokage's guard arrived. The second and third kick to the man's balls probably hadn't been entirely necessary in order to subdue him, considering the fact that he'd already been wrapped in nearly a mile of ninja wire, but considering the fact that Shiranui Genma had given him a fourth when he'd picked him up to carry him off to the T&I department, it was entirely possible that they had been.

Finding out that he'd had the Kyuubi sealed inside him had been quite the shock, but in hindsight, he should have been able to piece together all of the effing obvious clues and figured that out himself. While he was upset over the fact that his mother had helped seal the Kyuubi within him, he understood why she had done it, and was determined to carry his burden just as well as, no, better than she had. He was still upset to learn that everyone including most of his precious people had been hiding the reason that most of the villagers had hated him from him though.

With the way this night had gone, he would be spending the rest of the week blowing off steam in just about any and every way he could think of. He'd need it, especially considering why he'd come to the tower in the first place.

In a few short days, Uchiha Sasuke and Rabid Sasuke Fangirl #1 would be his teammates.

* * *

Umino Iruka smirked as he looked at the team assignment roster he'd just been handed. It was poetic justice in a sense. There had been an odd number of students that year, enough for nine full teams and a couple of spares. Since there wasn't room for them amongst this year's graduating teams, and there wasn't enough of them to form a tenth team, the two extras would have to either be apprenticed to one of the more experienced Jounin or be handed off to whoever had room on their teams for them. The "Whoever had room for them" in this case happened to be the sensei of the boy the two spares had been slandering for the last two years, a boy who had been a classmate of theirs before he had graduated two years early.

He felt a somewhat sadistic glee as he imagined those two's reactions to being placed on Naruto's team. He had gotten to know Naruto quite well over the year and a half that he'd had him as a student, and in the two years since he'd graduated. As a number of other shinobi had discovered over the years, he too had learned that it was hard not to like the boy once you got to know him, and he considered Naruto to be something like a little brother to him these days.

In the two years since the boy had graduated from the Academy, Naruto had gone on to make him proud to have been his sensei, and others envious of the fact that Naruto had been one of his students. Just a year before, having Naruto in his class wouldn't have been considered a high point in his career by his colleagues. Now however, when some shinobi listed his accomplishments, one of the items on the list that had garnered him a number of appreciative glances from his fellow Ninja was the fact that he had been one of Naruto's Academy Instructors.

One thing he wasn't so proud of however, despite the prestige of the position and the fact that it was yet another feather in his cap, was the fact that he was Uchiha Sasuke's Instructor as well. That boy just didn't know when to quit, and if he dug himself much deeper, he was going to pop out of his little hole on the other side of the world.

After giving a slightly evil chuckle that would have had those who remembered his prank pulling days diving for cover, he started reading off the list of new teams. As he read off the team roster to the potential Genin before him, the tension in the room became increasingly intense. Teams one through six seemed to be throwaways, but it was possible that one of them would surprise everyone and pass despite the fact that the dynamics between the students selected weren't the best, and the fact that the children on said teams were distressingly average, or worse, below average. Team Seven looked like a rather stable tracking team, and Yuuhi Kurenai would be a good teacher. Team Nine was the new Ino-Shika-Cho trio, and as the three had known each-other since birth, there was little doubt that they would pass.

Nobody failed to notice that a certain two names hadn't been listed when he'd read out the teams, and the tension in the room was palpable, as the students waited with bated breath to hear what the fate of that year's Top Rookie and Top Kunoichi would be.

"Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura," he said, after allowing the tension build a little more until it reached the point where it could practically be cut with a kunai. "As there weren't enough graduating students this year to form ten full teams, it has been decided that you will be placed on an already established team. From here on out, you will be assigned to Team Tetsuo. Your new sensei Shimura Tetsuo, and your new teammate Uzumaki Naruto will be by during lunch to pick you up, so please don't leave the room. The rest of you are dismissed for an hour."

Rather than there being an immediate scramble for the door like there usually was the instant after the students were dismissed, everyone in the class was still planted in their seats giving Sasuke and Sakura shocked and incredulous stares. Eventually, in ones and twos, the students started moving towards the door. As they departed, there were a number of mutters that were variants of "I'd hate to be in their position". He would empathize, but the two of them had brought whatever was coming to them on themselves.

**Edited 10-4-12**


	2. Sakura and Sasuke's Impressions

Sakura sat in the stifling silence that had been left behind when the rest of her graduating class had departed, wanting to break it somehow, but not knowing what to say or who to speak to since Sasuke-kun was obviously busy thinking and Umino-sensei was doing some last-minute paperwork. Any minute now, Naruto would be walking through the door with her new sensei in tow. Rather than being worried about meeting her new sensei as she had been when she had set out from home this morning, she was worried about seeing Naruto again.

Several months earlier, after more than a year of following Sasuke-kun's lead and slandering the boy who, as it turned out, really had been a ninja, she had needlessly antagonized him, and had learned the hard way that he was dangerous, as her mother had been telling her he was since the first time she saw him when they were little. In a way, what had happened that day had been all her fault since she hadn't stopped to think like she should have. The Naruto being a dropout scenario had been somewhat believable though. When Naruto was at the Academy, he had been an idiot and had been held up as an example of failure, and that had been why she had believed Sasuke-kun when he'd said that Naruto wasn't a ninja. How could the boy who was held up by their instructors as the worst of the worst, the one most likely to fail, the one who had never been able to dodge a singe punch from her, become a ninja before her Sasuke-kun who everyone said was a genius after all?

As it had turned out, Sasuke-kun had been wrong in this case, Naruto had indeed graduated the Academy early, and had indeed become a ninja. She had learned that the hard way several months ago when she had decided to hit him for old time's sake when she'd seen him hanging out on his old perch on the swing in the tree near the door, and instead of hitting him, found herself flat on the ground. The only reason she'd been able to land even a single blow on Naruto during his Academy days, as it turned out, had been because Naruto had let her hit him because he had liked her. Now he no-longer liked her, such privileges had been revoked.

When she'd seen that hard cold look in the boy's eyes as he threatened to break her arm if she tried to hit him again, she had run. In that moment, the boy who had been standing in front of her had most definitely not been the Naruto that she'd known at the Academy, the Naruto who had single-mindedly chased after her no matter how many times she violently rejected him. There was no laughter, no goofy grin, instead, there had been a complete stranger who had been sizing her up as a potential enemy and finding her lacking.

After she had told her mother about the fact that Naruto had threatened her, her mother had taken her to file a complaint against Naruto. When the Shinobi at the complaint desk had learned that she had attacked Naruto first, the man had gleefully informed her of exactly what she had antagonized earlier that day. Uzumaki Naruto was famous amongst the ranks of Konoha's shinobi, and not for being an idiot either. Naruto had become famous for tearing a team of Genin from Iwa apart with his bare hands.

That had been the day she had stopped backing Sasuke-kun up when he denied the fact that Naruto was a ninja. Not that Sasuke-kun had noticed this of course...

As she pulled out of her musing on her future teammate, she once again turned to Sasuke-kun to see how he was handling the team assignment. There was no indication in his face or body language that there was anything of note going on. Either Sasuke-kun was just that good at controlling his emotions, or he didn't think that there was anything to be concerned about despite the fact that he'd potentially made an enemy of someone who was exceedingly dangerous. She wished that she could be as unconcerned about their situation as he was.

As she heard the door to the classroom slide open, her heart began to pound at least twice as fast as normal. She turned to look as two people entered the room, a tallish man with brown hair and black eyes who wore the standard shinobi uniform, and...Naruto.

Just as it had been several months earlier, this wasn't the brash and loud prank pulling Naruto that she remembered from his days in the Academy. This wasn't the boy who had blinded everyone with a bright orange hoodie, and later a bright orange tracksuit, and an even brighter grin. This was a ninja. The orange was still there, albeit in a more subdued shade, but the smile sure as hell wasn't. Rather than cheerfully greeting her and calling her Sakura-chan like the Naruto she had once known, instead of yelling at Sasuke-kun about how he was going to beat him, this stranger who wore Naruto's face looked at both of them with a blankly neutral expression and cold eyes. Cold eyes that had sized both her and Sasuke-kun up and found them lacking.

Her inner self seemed to agree with her assessment of the boy she no-longer knew based on the way it was trembling in a corner of her mind rather than yelling defiantly about how she was going to rule now that she was a ninja.

It was with a sense of trepidation that she followed her new teammates to whatever fate awaited her.

* * *

Shimura Tetsuo sighed after he listened to his new students' introductions. This was the year's top two students? It would seem that he definitely had his work cut out for him. The Kunoichi was a brainiac fangirl whose astronomical academic scores had made up for her abysmal physical ones, a fact that was made painfully obvious by her apparent lack of muscle tone. And the Uchiha...The Uchiha was disturbed at best, and completely unhinged at worst. Whoever had written their files had been glossing over a great deal, and all of it bad if what he'd just seen was any indication. Someone should have picked a more balanced Kunoichi for the top position, and called the Psych-nin on the Uchiha years ago.

If it hadn't been for the promise he'd made Naruto when he Suzume and Satoshi had left for Iwa back in June, he would have immediately thrown these two back and requested more students in the Spring. As it was, he was seriously considering doing so anyways. How he was going to turn this mess into a cohesive team in two months, he didn't know. As it stood, it looked like he would be forced to neglect Naruto in order to get his teammates in shape. He didn't want to do so, especially since a good deal of the recent progress he'd made with Naruto would be lost, but unless a reasonable solution could be found, that may just end up being the case.

Hatake Kakashi had been talking about wanting to train Naruto, perhaps, if he phrased things the right way, he could get him to help...

Grumbling over the fact that the plans he'd made were going to be absolutely useless since what was standing in front of him didn't come close to matching the reports, not by a long shot, he dismissed the team and ordered them to meet him tomorrow. Hopefully, by then, he'd have a workable plan of action. One day soon, he was going to track down that Mizuki fellow who had done Sasuke and Sakura's evaluations and give him a piece of his mind, a very sharp and painful piece of his mind.

* * *

Sasuke watched as the Uzumaki walked through the village with his new sensei. He wasn't stalking them per se, but the Uzumaki was an uncertain element and he needed to know where he fit, since he didn't fit where he'd pegged him all those years ago. This Uzumaki most definitely wasn't the loud and reckless failure from the Academy. This Uzumaki wasn't the brat who had tried to rub his face in his early graduation only to be met with disbelief over the fact that he'd graduated. This Uzumaki was something else entirely. Something harder, something colder, something more like It- That Man had been.

"...sure that the guys at the prison'll let you in to see him after the T&I department's done with him..." Naruto was saying as the boy and their sensei passed under the tree in which he was perched, either not noticing that he was there, or more likely not caring.

"...about Umino Iruka?" Shimura was asking as they continued walking, and he found himself following, trying to get a measure of his new teammate who had become a completely different person since he'd last bothered to actually look at him.

"He's always been fair, at least to me." the Uzumaki replied sounding much happier as he walked along with his sensei than he had during the team introductions. "It took him a while to admit that he hadn't been the one to nominate me for early graduation. Apparently, one or more of the other Instructors had decided to fail me out of the Academy, ya know the whole three strikes you're out thing. They'd been certain I'd fail when they nominated me, but they ended up making a bit of a mistake and picked the wrong Jutsu to test me on during the graduation exam. If they'd tested me on the Bunshin, I'd probably be trying and failing to find a job as a civilian right now."

Shimura winced at this, apparently recalling a painful memory involving the Uzumaki and the Bunshin Jutsu. Either that, or he'd winced at the thought of the Uzumaki trying to become a civilian. He'd wince at that too. Neither the cretin he remembered from the Academy nor the Uzumaki he was looking at now would make it as a civilian.

"Another year at the Academy wouldnt've hurt." Shimura eventually said.

"If the Instructors had been like you and Iruka-sensei maybe." the Uzumaki said somewhat bitterly. "They pretty much completely ignored me before Iruka-sensei arrived, and even Iruka-sensei ignored me at first. I don't even want to know what that Mizuki bastard would have done to my education if I'd stayed, considering the fact that he was a traitor. I graduated though, so there's no point in wondering 'What If...'."

Despite himself, Sasuke found himself trying to recall what it had been like back when Naruto was at the Academy. The thing was, the boy hadn't actually joined his class until the day Umino Iruka had become an Instructor, so he hadn't actually known him before then, since just about everyone had avoided him when the classes were let out to the yard for Lunch and Recess, or were let out at the end of the day. Since the Uzumaki had joined the class after the Massacre, he'd automatically shut him out like he did just about everyone else back then. He recalled that there had been some tension between the Umino and the Uzumaki though, and if he remembered correctly, it had been because the Uzumaki had caught the Umino in a couple of pranks that...had...actually...worked.

If that had been what the Uzumaki had been like with everyone ignoring him, what could he have been had he had the attention of all of the Instructors and had been given constant offers of help like he had been? Would the Uzumaki have tied It- His record, or beaten it?

The Uzumaki had graduated the Academy two years early with little or no help from the Instructors aside from Umino Iruka, and with no help at home since he had no clan, no family, no parents to teach him anything. Because everyone had been acting like the Uzumaki belonged beneath their notice, he had believed it was so, and placed the Uzumaki beneath his notice. In doing so however, he had made the serious mistake of drastically underestimating him. As a consequence, he had been left in the dust by someone he'd thought was so far beneath him it wasn't even funny, and didn't even realize it until it was far too late because, who would believe that the so-called moron who had appeared to fail at just about everything would graduate before the class genius?

He would not be making that mistake again.

Now that he knew that the Uzumaki was actually a genius like He had been, he would be testing himself against him to see how far he'd actually come in his quest to avenge his clan. He would surpass the Uzumaki, and then he would climb even higher until he was at, no, above His level.

**Edited 10-04-12**


	3. Asking Favors

_Funny, _Shimura Tetsuo reflected _Despite the fact that Hatake Kakashi rarely goes out to drink, almost every time I've met him is in a bar._

For some strange reason, instead of giving him, what was for Kakashi, a friendly greeting like he usually did, the man was glaring at him as if he'd just stole the last roll of toilet paper in the public restroom while he'd been using it, which was beyond evil in the ninja world where killing was as common as breathing, and toilet paper was something to be treasured because you couldn't always get your hands on it when you were out in the field,

"What'd I do?" he asked as he sat down next to the Hatake at the bar, wondering how he could've upset the man so badly.

"Nothing." the man replied, obviously still beyond upset at him, which was rather strange considering the fact that they'd gotten on well enough for the past two years, and they'd been on good terms when they'd most recently parted. They weren't the best of buddies, especially since he'd once conned a favor out of the man, but he'd thought it was safe to consider Kakashi to be amongst his circle of friends.

"What is this about then?" he asked, wondering what the hell was up with the other man who was still glaring at him.

"...Naruto." the Hatake eventually replied.

"That's funny, I came here to talk to you about something related to him." he said, hoping that he wasn't putting his foot in his mouth because Naruto had done something to the man that had upset him to the point that he was ready to take his anger out on anyone who was even tangentially related to the boy.

"What about?" the man who was sitting next to him, glaring at him while nursing his drink, asked sourly.

"How much vacation time can you take before it starts seriously eating into your savings?" he asked, hoping that he hadn't just wasted his breath, and quite possibly what little capital he had with the man.

"Quite a bit, why?" the Hatake asked almost suspiciously.

"Because I've got a team that I want to get ready for the Chunin Exams in two months, and I'm going to need some serious help." he replied, despite knowing that any efforts he'd make in this endeavor would most likely be futile, but holding out hope that there might be a slim chance that he could succeed, and that the Hatake would help him do it for Naruto. For some strange reason, the other Jounin had a soft spot for his student, or at least he usually did. Hopefully, because of that soft spot, the Hatake would get over whatever anger he had at Naruto and do what was best for the boy.

"Let me get this straight, you've got Naruto who's beyond ready to become a Chunin, the Rookie of the Year and this year's Top Kunoichi, and you need MY help to get them ready for something that should pretty much be in the bag if even half the things I've heard about the Uchiha are true?" the Hatake asked incredulously, his anger having apparently been replaced by shock.

"Normally, it would be in the bag, but one of the Instructors for this year's crop of Genin was a traitor, and I don't even know where to begin with what he left behind." he replied, feeling the weight of the challenge he'd taken upon himself begin to bear down on him once more. "Normally, I wouldn't have even tried this, and would've tossed the Uchiha and the Haruno back, but I promised Naruto that he wouldn't miss another Chunin Exam. It hurts to watch Naruto hurting over the fact that through no fault of his own, he's been left behind. I don't expect the pink haired girl and the Uchiha to become Chunin, but I do want them to be able to pull something approaching their own weight in the portions of the Exams that require a team when the time comes."

Apparently, if the expression on the visible portion of the Hatake's face was any indication, he'd found and said the magic words.

* * *

Naruto sighed as he waited for his sensei to arrive. He was unusually late which had him worried, since that was a sign that something might be seriously wrong. The last time that his sensei had been anywhere near this late had been when Kakashi had dragged him off on some stupid adventure. He wasn't entirely sure what had happened, but it had involved them tripping over the cats that the old lady over on Life street kept. Those things were vicious, and if you weren't careful around them, you could get seriously hurt. Fortunately, all of the old lady's little monsters were black, so there were few worries of running into a normal-looking cat and getting your face shredded for just looking at it. Normally, his sensei's tardiness wouldn't be too much of a problem because he had several independent study projects he could be working on, but today was different.

Today, he had new teammates. New teammates who were making absolutely no effort to get acquainted with him, or re-acquainted rather, since they'd known each-other back at the Academy. Neither Sakura, who seemed rather wary of him, nor Sasuke, who seemed to be lost in his own little world, had made any attempts at conversation with him since they'd arrived, and had stopped conversing with each-other for a while after Sasuke had shot Sakura down with as few words as possible.

"You know, you two are damned lucky." he said, breaking the silence after growing tired of watching Sasuke and Sakura who were both sitting far away from him, and making no attempts at communicating with him.

"How's that?" Sakura asked after flinching and jumping when he'd broken the silence, while Sasuke scowled at him.

"If this is how the two of you normally behave, you'd've bombed out on the final graduation test if you'd've been placed normally after graduation instead of filling the empty spaces on my team." he replied, wondering if Tetsuo-sensei's skipping the test for his sake had been worth it.

There was a look of confusion on both of their faces at this, the one on Sasuke's was less apparent however. Sasuke was a stuck up ass who saw just about everything as being beneath his notice, and it showed.

"But we passed..." Sakura started.

"You passed the test meant to weed out the hopeless incompetents." he replied. "After that, there is another test that the Jounin sensei gives that normally at least two-thirds of the students fail."

At this point Sasuke started muttering something about biased personality evaluations and how he'd've never failed them because everyone was too busy kissing up to him. That boy was a potential problem and he would have to keep an eye out for anything coming from his corner. This went so far beyond stuck-up that it wasn't even funny, and was probably a sign of something else, especially considering what happened to him four years ago.

"Do you know why at least two thirds of the class fails this test?" he asked, cutting across the Uchiha's pointless and nearly inaudible muttering.

"Why?" Sakura asked.

"Because the complete nincompoops who fail couldn't put aside their differences and work together as a team long enough to complete one measly mission." he replied, remembering the stories of what had happened before the teamwork portion of the Genin test had been instated a couple years after the founding of the Academy. "The final graduation test is based on teamwork. The first two portions of the Chunin Exams are almost always based on teamwork. Almost all of the missions given out in every last ninja village across the continent are assigned to a team."

"In the ninja world," he continued, noticing that Sakura at least was paying attention. "If you can't work on a team, you almost always either get someone, quite possibly yourself, killed or you get booted out because everyone refuses to work with you because they don't want themselves or their comrades dying needlessly because of something you've done. Those who think that they can take all of the glory for themselves, and that their teammates are holding them back, almost always either get themselves killed or their teammates killed in the long run. Enough things can go wrong on a normal mission, and we don't need the added complication of a "Lone Wolf" running around making things worse by destroying plans that would've otherwise worked had the entire team worked together."

Sakura looked appropriately chastened at this. Sasuke however, Sasuke had given him the handsign equivalent of "Whatever, I'm not listening to you.". Considering the boy's usual attitude, he probably wasn't even aware that he'd done it. Or, more likely, considering the crap people let him get away with because he was the "Poor orphaned Last of the Uchiha", he'd known full well what he'd done, and expected him to take it like everyone else did. Fat chance of that happening. If that boy didn't get an attitude adjustment soon, he was going to end up dead, and it would probably even be his own teammates who killed him.

Giving the Uchiha a look that clearly said "I'm not going to put up with your crap.", he replied with a rather vulgar handsign he'd picked up from a KMPF officer back before they'd all vanished. The other boy looked shocked for a moment, then there was an expression of "I can't believe he just said that" which was rapidly replaced with a look of anger. No, this went beyond anger and climbed the scale into absolute outraged fury. The pissed off Uchiha then launched himself at him, but in the instant before he reached where he was standing, waiting to defend himself, however, Hatake Kakashi, who'd just Shunshined in with Tetsuo-sensei, grabbed him out of the air, flung him to the ground, and restrained him.

"No trying to kill your teammates." Kakashi said to the boy who was pinned on the ground.

"Well, now that that's over." Tetsuo-sensei said, determinedly ignoring Sasuke who was pinned beneath Kakashi. "Go home and pack for an extended camping trip, and return here in three hours."

"How long will we be gone sensei?" Sakura asked, after actually raising her hand and waiting to be acknowledged by Tetsuo-sensei.

"Two months." Tetsuo-sensei replied, obviously having something planned, something that would most likely be highly unpleasant for all of them, like his team's first hundred-mile hike had been.

"But..." Sakura started, quite likely about to object to a Winter camping trip, which was an unpleasant prospect in and of itself.

"I've already okayed it with the Hokage." Tetsuo-sensei replied. "Now go home and pack."

He turned and headed back to his apartment in order to comply with Tetsuo-sense's orders, quietly hoping that he survived what was coming with what was left of his sanity intact. Two months in the wilderness with Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei wouldn't be too bad. Two months with Haruno Sakura and his highness Uchiha Sasuke however...

**Edited 10-04-12**


	4. Dealing With Sakura's Mother

Sakura didn't know what to think as she'd headed home. Sure, she'd heard that training after the Academy was supposed to be more intense, but she hadn't expected to be sent on a two month camping trip right off the bat, especially at this time of year. That whole thing that Naruto had said about teamwork made sense though, especially when she stopped to think about it and applied what she'd seen while wandering around the village as she was growing up to what Naruto had pointed out. Though she hadn't really noticed or payed attention to it before, there were always two Chunin manning the guard desk at the gate, and there were teams of Chunin manning key points of the village walls. Rarely in fact had she seen a ninja by themselves, and when she did, that had almost always been because they were either running messages or off-duty. Even then, the off-duty ninja tended to cluster together in groups of two or more.

When she got home, she headed straight up to her room in order to pack for the camping trip. As she sorted through her belongings, she found she didn't quite know what to bring and what to leave behind. She'd started off by following the Academy guidelines for extended missions in wilderness environments, but noticed that other things she needed to bring with her had not been on the list, such as the beauty products she needed in order to remain pretty enough to catch Sasuke-kun's attention amongst other things. When she'd packed everything she'd thought she needed, she couldn't lift her overfull bags, much less carry them. She didn't know what to get rid of or what to keep however.

Her mother came upstairs an hour later and found her crying as she tried to sort through her stuff.

"What's wrong sweetheart?" her mother asked as she hugged her and did her best to comfort her.

"Sensei's taking us on a long camping trip, and I don't know what to bring." she finally wailed, hoping her mother would be able to fix everything like she used to when she was little. "I have to be ready and at the training field in an hour!"

"How long are you going to be gone dear?" her mother asked.

"Two months." she replied sniffing as her mother dried her tears with the hem of her long skirt like she used to when she came home crying because the other girls at the Academy had picked on her when when she was younger.

"Two months!" her mother exclaimed, dropping her skirt in shock. "That can't be right. Come on dear, we'll be having a word with your new sensei in order to clear up this misunderstanding."

With that, her mother dragged her out to the training field where Sasuke-kun would most assuredly see that she'd been crying since he was already sitting there with Naruto, both of whom were seated next to full packs. The silver haired man who had been with their new sensei when he'd arrived, and who had restrained Sasuke-kun as easily as if he were merely an unruly toddler, arrived as they approached, carrying a rather light looking pack himself.

"That's a rather unusual piece of luggage." her new sensei commented sarcastically when he noticed her and who was with her as he came in from a different direction. "Do you intend to carry it the entire way?"

"What's the meaning of this?" her mother asked, clearly intending to cow her new sensei the way she did her father when he did something she didn't like. "Making my daughter go away for two months with two strange men and that...that boy for company?! It isn't proper! I have half a mind to..."

"Proper? Proper?" her new sensei said incredulously, cutting her mother off before she could build up steam. "Lady, the day your daughter became a ninja, "Proper" got thrown out the window. Your daughter is now a ninja under my command, and it is what I say that goes. If I want to order her to go on a hundred mile hike in her underwear in the middle of a thunderstorm for no reason other than because I want to be a sadistic bastard, I can. If I want to take your daughter for two months of intense training in order to bring her up to something approaching my standards, that's well within my rights as well, and there's nothing you can say or do about it. You signed away your rights to your child the instant you put your name down on the Academy admission form. It is only out of the kindness of the Hokage's heart that you were allowed to keep her in your home. Some villages I can name don't even allow you that much."

Considering the fact that her mother turned pale and then bright red at this before puffing up in indignation, her sensei had obviously gone so far beyond saying the wrong thing it wasn't even funny. This was going to be bad, and not just because her mother had just completely embarrassed her in front of her team and a total stranger. The last time someone had upset her mother that badly, she had caused them to be ostracized by the rest of the neighborhood, and they'd had to move. From the looks of it, her mother was gearing up for an Extreme Mode like no other. She could only imagine what would happen if her mother tried that with her new sensei. Her seinsei wasn't a family of foreign civilians, and more than likely wouldn't be nearly as easily brought down as they had. If he was brought down though, a man like that, a man who had trained someone as dangerous as Naruto, could easily kill her mother in revenge.

"Well I never...!" her mother angrily exclaimed. "I'll be having words with the Hokage about this."

"You do that." her new sensei replied snarkily, clearly upset with her mother over something she'd said earlier. "And, since Sakura seems confident enough in her survival skills that she only packed the clothes on her back, we'd better get a move on. We need to get our team photo taken and be out of the village by sunset, since our first mission takes place twenty-five miles away from here, we're due there at dawn tomorrow, and the Rookie Genin are going to slow us down considerably."

An instant later, she found herself being dragged off by her sensei who had ignored her mother who was yelling and sputtering behind her. Apparently, he had actually been serious, and there would be no going home to get her stuff. There would be no hugging her mother goodbye or stopping by the bank to tell her father where she was going either. There would just be her, her new team in front of whom she'd just been humiliated by her mother and her sensei, and two months of wilderness.

The last view she had of her mother before she was dragged around the corner and towards the administration complex was of a red-faced woman whose bosom was heaving angrily.

* * *

Haruno Barako stormed over to the complaint desk. Not that it had done her any good the last time she was here, but it was the last official option available to her. She had tried to get an audience with the Hokage earlier, and failed. The important looking old woman who had been exiting the Hokage's office when she'd tried standing outside it hoping to catch the man as he left hadn't helped her at all either. As soon as the woman had heard what her daughter's name was, she'd congratulated her for having such an exceptional daughter and walked off.

Since she wasn't going to be getting any help from the Hokage, she would be filing a complaint, and then she would be telling everyone about this outrage. If that bastard who had taken her daughter had any family in the village, they'd be sent packing if she had anything to say about it. She'd already sent one family packing for the capitol, she could do so again.

"Hello," she said once she'd reached the complaints desk which had been worse than useless last time, as the man there had further traumatized her poor daughter who had been traumatized enough by the ordeal that the demon child had put her through. "I'd like to file a complaint against Shimura Tetsuo and a shinobi with silver hair and a mask that covers most of his face."

The bored looking man behind the desk, who had obviously been put there because he was old and crippled and refused to do the decent thing and retire, looked up at her blankly. For a moment, it seemed as if the man had sized her up and dismissed her as worthless, and she didn't like the way that made her feel. If this geezer didn't do as she asked, she would be making his life a living hell as well.

"What has the boy done this time?" the old man asked, sounding resigned.

"He's kidnapped my daughter!" she exclaimed, hoping that would garner the reaction necessary in order to call that contemptible man the Hokage had rather foolishly placed in charge of his daughter's education and his team back to the village before they got too far away.

After her Sakura was returned safe and sound, she'd make sure the man couldn't take her daughter away before he tried to leave with her again. Then, she'd do everything she could to make sure that the bastard was thrown out of the shinobi forces. A disrespectful man like that had no business being a ninja. Seeing as he was the demon brat's teacher, she was certain that she would have little problem accomplishing her goals and chasing him and his family away from the village, especially considering that accent of his that was clearly not of Fire Country origin.

* * *

Danzo blinked in surprise. What the woman who was standing in front of him had accused The Boy of didn't sound anything like his son's and the Tea Country whore's child at all. As far as he knew, despite some recent difficulties in the relationship that seemed to stem from the changes that the birth of his first great-grandchild has caused, The Boy had been entirely faithful to his wife. That, and it wasn't like The Boy to shirk his duties in order to run off with some harlot, especially when he was supposed to be taking the Weapon and the Uchiha brat on a training trip in order to prepare them for the upcoming Chunin Exams in January which, in his opinion, was a futile effort considering the Uchiha's current attitude, and how weak the third member of the team who was little more than baggage was.

The reason he was manning the complaints desk today was because when Sarutobi got particularly bored and was feeling mischievous, or was exceedingly unhappy with them, he had a tendency to give him and the other Council members somewhat demeaning assignments. On more than one occasion, he, Koharu, and Homura had been forced to pull guard duty during the midnight to 4 a.m. shift. It wasn't worth the potential fallout to defy the Hokage when he was such a mood, and he didn't particularly mind being relegated to the Complaints Desk all that much. It usually gave him a few hours of peace and quiet in which he could curl up with a good book, which was something he otherwise hadn't had the time for in years. Sometimes however, there were people like the woman in front of him though...

He swiftly got over his surprise over the accusation that had been leveled at his grandson when he noted the woman's resemblance to The Boy's female student. The Haruno girl had only been this year's Top Kunoichi because there had been a spectacularly mediocre crop of students this year. The Haruno girl was just a bit smarter than the Yamanaka girl, who had also been neglecting her physical training in order to gain the Uchiha's attention, and a great deal smarter than the rest of the pack aside from the Hyuuga girl who should have easily been able to shove her from the position if she'd even bothered to try, but lacked the confidence to do so.

If he remembered correctly, the last time the Haruno girl's mother had been in here had been because her daughter had needlessly antagonized the Weapon. The person who had been at the desk then had put the girl in her place when she'd tried to register a complaint over the fact that she'd gotten what she'd deserved, but had apparently failed to do so for the woman. Because the man had failed to put the elder Haruno in her place, he was the one who was forced to deal with her now. Deciding that he would be needing a little help if he was going to be dealing with the woman when she was like this, he got up to leave for a coffee break.

"I'll look into it right away ma'am." he said false politely, in order to placate the rampaging monster who had given birth to The Boy's female student, as he left for his unannounced break.

As soon as he was in the Administrative Department breakroom, he checked to make sure he was alone before pouring himself a cup of coffee and reaching into his robes and pulling out a flask which he opened with his teeth before dumping a generous amount of its contents into his coffee. The cup, which had previously been half full was now completely so. He then sat down in one of the chairs that were tucked in the corner that gave one a good view of the entire room and, most importantly, the entrance, and slowly drank his coffee before grabbing a breath-mint and popping it into his mouth. He sucked on the breath-mint as he put his mug in the sink and shuffled his way back to the desk where the Haruno woman was still waiting despite his somewhat forlorn hope that she wouldn't be, and would have gotten herself arrested for storming off and bothering Sarutobi.

As if he would be so lucky.

"Ma'am." he said once he'd reached the desk that half an hour earlier had been a peaceful oasis in a sea of activity "I checked, and according to the information I was given, your daughter is on an authorized training trip with her new sensei Shimura Tetsuo and the Jounin Hatake Kakashi. As such, I cannot file a complaint of kidnapping against the man or his companion who matches Hatake's description."

He then leaned back and waited for the expected storm. If it weren't for what Sarutobi would do to him if he ordered the assassinations of random Konoha civilians because they'd bothered him, he would have given the kill order when he'd gone for his coffee rather than rather liberally laced it with alcohol. It was a pity that Konoha didn't follow the example of some other villages he could name and impose a fine for the killing of a civilian rather than jail time. He could run ROOT from prison if he had to, but it would be damned inconvenient.

**Edited 10-04-12**


	5. 25 Mile Hike

Tetsuo watched the slightly shell shocked Sakura out of the corner of his eye as the group paused for yet another break because the girl couldn't handle a measly twenty-five mile hike. When it came to giving the seemingly useless fangirl a wake-up call, he couldn't have planned things better than how they'd turned out, despite the fact that he hadn't planned for things to turn out this way. With no clothes, weapons, or supplies packed away, the girl would have to put all of her survival training from the Academy to the test in order to live in anything approaching comfort over the next two months. He wouldn't let the girl starve, but he wouldn't be going easy on her either, and he would be instructing Naruto not to go easy on her as well. Considering the Uchiha's attitude, he had a feeling that the boy wouldn't be willingly sharing any of his supplies if at all, and Kakashi seemed to find the whole situation amusing.

That girl would be shaping up long before she got any of her teammates killed the way his friend's teammate who had been just like her had gotten him killed soon after they'd graduated from the Academy. It may be a time of peace now, but that didn't mean that things couldn't go wrong. By the time this trip was over, that girl wouldn't have a neat manicure, and would have learned to settle for nails that had merely been trimmed so they wouldn't get in the way, she would all but forget that lip-gloss existed, and would either learn to take care of her long hair in a timely manner or be forced to get rid of it.

In the Ninja world, long hair was something of a liability. Amongst the more experienced ninja, hair generally wasn't grown out for beauty. It was grown to be a challenge that would goad your enemy into coming within striking range. That was one of the reasons why it was so damn common amongst the Hyuuga, and why both the Shodai Hokage and Uchiha Madara both had hair that went down to their waists. Any moron who tried to grab a ninja's hair, especially in battle, deserved what they got. Especially if they made the mistake of being stupid enough to try getting their hands on a Hyuuga's hair.

That violent "My way or no way at all!" attitude that the girl had clearly inherited from her mother would be going too if he had his say. In order to do so, he would be channeling the girl's violent tendencies towards more productive areas, much as he had channeled Naruto's hyperactivity and propensity for pranks into something that had been useful for his career. Naruto could be an attention-seeking loudmouth at times but, he'd calmed down a great deal from where he'd been when he'd first graduated the Academy. The reason for this had been two years of hard work on his part as well as a particularly violent wake-up call that he wouldn't have wished on an enemy. If you saw Naruto when he was off duty and in a good mood however, you'd be more inclined to draw parallels between him and the boy who had been placed on his team two years ago.

Speaking of Naruto, he could see the boy moving towards his canteen with the intention of offering water to Sakura. While he was tempted to let the girl go thirsty for a while longer, it could be dangerous considering the fact that the girl obviously wasn't in the best of health due to whatever "diet" she had put herself on. Based on how thin she was, her diet had obviously not been supervised by her Instructors, and had likely been encouraged by either her peers, or by her civilian mother who clearly knew nothing of Shinobi life.

He gave the boy a slight nod indicating that it would be alright to share with the girl whom he would have sent hunting for her own water had there been a readily available source nearby. It would be humbling for the girl to be forced to depend on the teammate she had previously treated with a great deal of cruelty and contempt, but right now, that was what she needed. The sooner the girl learned some humility amongst other things, numerous other things, the sooner she would be able to work properly with a team.

After flinching away from Naruto until she spotted the canteen he was holding out to her, the girl greedily gulped down the water that Naruto offered. He would be teaching the girl about conserving water later on, especially because, if he had his way, they would be going to Suna. And, even if he didn't have his way, they would be traveling to Wind Country near the end of their trip anyway.

Suna, which the team would hopefully be going to in January, was located in the middle of a desert that spanned across the vast majority of Wind Country and into parts of Earth, and was hot in the Winter and even hotter in the Summer. Suna, where he'd participated in the Chunin Exams for the second time, and had watched someone who could have conceivably been related to Naruto beat the crap out of his sensei despite the fact that he had to have been at least twice his sensei's age and his sensei had several inches and at least twenty pounds on him. Suna where he himself had become a Chunin. God, he missed that place, and couldn't wait to be back.

It was a good thing that Suna was Konoha's ally because, in order to prepare the team for the Chunin Exams, he had arranged with the Hokage to have the team be placed on a joint C Rank bandit clearing mission in Wind Country in December. Leading up to that mission, the team would be taking a number of high D and low C ranked missions on their way up through Fire Country and into Wind as they trained. After the mission in Wind Country was over, they would be heading back to Konoha at a respectable pace.

A respectable pace for a shinobi that was.

Once the team returned to Konoha, they would be evaluated by an independent instructor. If it was determined that Sasuke and Sakura had reached an acceptable level of skill, they would promptly head out to Suna where they would be entered into the Chunin Exam alongside Naruto. If it was determined that they weren't quite ready for the Exams, they would train like hell until the next Chunin Exam took place, wherever that might be. He personally would be very disappointed if they had to wait until July to participate in the exams, even though it was starting to look more and more like a certainty with each passing minute, despite the fact that Hatake Kakashi himself had agreed to help him out with his insane plan.

If they could pull this off, people would be talking about it for years to come, if not decades. If they couldn't, people would still be talking about it, but for different reasons.

* * *

Kakashi wasn't quite sure how he should feel about the situation he was in at the moment. While he was being given the opportunity to teach Naruto like he'd promised Minato-sensei he would, he wasn't Naruto's sensei, and that was all his fault for being late to the all-important meeting which would have netted him Naruto as his student. Naruto's sensei wasn't a bad person, but he also wasn't him.

Two years ago, it had taken Naruto being given to someone else to cause him to approach the boy when he had been given a legitimate opportunity to do so. He knew that he should have been there all along but, even looking at Naruto, who was a cross between both of his parents with a little bit of Obito thrown in for flavoring, was painful. Why he had spent years assuming that the Hokage would give Naruto to him when he graduated the Academy when he hadn't shown any interest in caring for the child before, he didn't know. Because he'd avoided Naruto for so long, he had been forced to pay for this negligence by watching someone else train what should've been his student.

When Shimura Tetsuo's other two students had been promoted to Chunin and decided to fly a bit before coming back to their sensei, he had sensed a potential opportunity and tried to jump on it. His habit of tardiness however had turned around and bit him in the ass this time however, as he'd shown up just a bit too late for the meeting he'd scheduled with the Hokage who had grown tired of waiting for him and forced him to reschedule. By the time he'd rescheduled the meeting and showed up only ten minutes late this time, Shimura had applied for and been given a pair of new Genin to fill the gap on his team, and he was informed that he was excused from babysitting a team he was just going to fail this year.

When the younger Shimura had given him the opportunity to train Naruto like he should have been doing from the start, he had jumped at it since it wasn't like he really had anything better to do with his time at the moment. The thing was, Naruto came with a bit of extra baggage in the form of Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura. The fact that he had the Sharingan meant that he would have eventually been assigned to give the Uchiha a few lessons at the very least, which made the Uchiha's presence less of a chore since he would be getting at least part of that responsibility out of the way. Haruno Saukura, who would be forced to depend on her wits and her teammates to survive since she had neglected to pack, was another matter entirely however. Under normal circumstances, he never would have bothered with the girl who honestly should have been cut loose from the program.

He didn't really care for dealing with the Uchiha's attitude problem or the Haruno's ineptness but, if he kept telling himself that this was for Naruto, maybe he would get through this, since he'd promised to help out with the training, and it would be a real dick move to change his mind in the middle of it and turn around and go home. It was trying however, considering the fact that they were making the most atrocious time he'd ever made in his career on the twenty-five mile journey to the farm where the team's first mission would be taking place. It was the middle of the night, and they still had five more miles to go, rather than already being there as they would have been if they hadn't had to bring the Rookies along.

Eventually, five miles became four, and four became three, with the pink haired girl whining the whole way. Three finally became two, then one, then, after what seemed like an eternity, they were finally finished, and the pink haired girl completely collapsed. After checking to make sure that the girl wasn't in need of immediate medical attention, and signalling to Shimura that he was going to be sleeping because he hadn't gotten any the night before and maybe three hours total the night before that, he headed into one of the trees to catch a bit of sleep during what remained of the night.

As he closed his eyes, he saw Naruto pulling a blanket from a storage scroll and covering the Haruno girl, who would most likely be completely useless tomorrow, with it. The Uchiha boy, who had promptly sat down on a rock the instant the journey was over, was breathing heavily as if he hadn't been forced to undergo such strenuous activity before. If that was the best the Academy had to offer, he didn't even want to see what the worst was. He'd heard that they'd made the curriculum a bit easier in order to be able to turn out more ninja at the end of the war and after the Kyuubi attack, but this was ridiculous. Back when he'd graduated the Academy, he would have been able to complete the hike they'd just been on with little fuss, and he'd been five. Apparently, the rumors he'd heard about a traitor working at the Academy and sabotaging the students' educations was true.

* * *

Naruto sighed when he realized that Sasuke was scowling at him again, most likely jealous over the fact that he barely seemed to have been affected by the little walk they'd just been on. The other boy was completely winded, and he could understand how he was feeling. He'd been the same after his first twenty-five mile hike. Tetsuo-sensei had a bad habit of taking the team on exceedingly long hikes when he thought that they had too much energy to burn. His first hundred mile hike hadn't quite been in his underwear during a thunderstorm, but it had been quite miserable, and the entire team - Tetsuo-sensei included - had been in a foul mood by the time it was over.

There would be no sleep for him tonight. It was already three in the morning, and dawn was only a few hours off. With Kakashi, Sakura, and Sasuke out of commission, it would be up to him and Tetsuo-sensei to take watch until sunup. They could take shifts, but he tended to be extremely groggy if he only got an hour or two of sleep. It would be better for him to remain awake for the rest of the day, and crash at the first opportunity he got after dinner.

"Get some sleep Sasuke." he said to the boy who was finally beginning to catch his breath. "Tetsuo-sensei and I will stand watch."

The boy nodded before unrolling the bedroll that he'd strapped to the top of his pack. This made him wonder exactly how much or how little the boy had packed since he didn't see any storage scrolls stashed in the bag when the boy had opened it to grab a ration bar during one of their breaks. That then made him wonder what Sakura was going to do for clothes since she only had the ones she was wearing. He was probably going to have to loan her just about everything. He had some spare clothes of his own packed away, but the only thing that looked like it might fit her, considering how much taller than him she was, was his orange and blue tracksuit which he occasionally wore while he was off-duty. The only one in that color that had been available at the time he'd purchased it a little over two years earlier had been several sizes too large for him, and was still a bit big on him even now. It should suit her just fine.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	6. Haruno vs Shimura

Sasuke was woken up bright and early in the morning by a kunai landing a couple of inches away from his head. Startled, he rolled and sprang into a defensive position only to find that there was no threat, and that it had been his new sensei who had thrown the kunai. If he hadn't gone through a number of training sessions which had taken most of the night to complete, and been forced to wake up in time to get to the Academy the morning afterward before, he probably wouldn't have been able to function after getting only a few hours of sleep after being dragged on a twenty-five mile hike with a full pack, and that was even with the additional surge of adrenaline his sensei's unconventional wake-up call had given him.

Today, he would be undertaking his first mission with the new and unwanted team which he was going to be stuck with indefinitely. The nature of this mission you ask? It was to repair a bunch of fences on a farm that belonged to Konoha for some strange reason. If anyone had cared to ask him, he would have told them that it was a chore that was beneath someone who held the title of ninja. He'd say that it was completely beneath a Uchiha as well but, he'd seen one or two of his civilian relatives mending fences in the compound back when they were alive.

Because the pink haired fangirl was so weak, and had been completely unable to handle yesterday's hike, it would be just him and the Uzumaki who were stuck with the job today. Fortunately for him, the Uzumaki seemed to be familiar with this sort of work, because he wasn't, and had had a, now unfortunate, tendency to ignore the lessons on how to pass oneself off as a laborer during a mission when they came up back at the Academy. The written tests for those classes, which he'd aced since they were all multiple choice, had left him decidedly unprepared for this sort of mission.

Grumbling as walked because his legs were sore from walking all day and night at the pace of the group's slowest member because neither Tetsuo nor Kakashi would carry Sakura despite the fact that she was slowing them down, he made his way over to where Tetsuo and the Uzumaki were seated.

"Eat something, and we'll report to Tanaka-san." Tetsuo said when he reached the pair.

* * *

As Sasuke, Naruto, and Tetsuo were getting a start on their D-ranked fence mending mission, and Kakashi was watching Sakura to make sure nothing happened to her, like her dying in her sleep for instance, Sakura's mother was getting an early start on her campaign against Sakura's new sensei. There was one thing that Haruno Barako was good at, and that was that, despite being a mere civilian housewife, she could run a whisper campaign against someone that could put the best efforts of the Misinformation department to shame.

She hadn't needed to go to the market for anything that morning, but Konoha's central marketplace was the best place to get the ball rolling as she spread bits of gossip amongst the other housewives and the old biddies who had nothing better to do. Setting out bright and early so as best to be amongst the elderly early birds who would spread her story far and wide across the village because they had nothing better to do with their day, she made her way to the marketplace. Once she reached the market, she made sure to wander despondently amongst the various stands and stalls as she "searched for what she needed".

Eventually, one of the old ladies who frequented the early-morning market nibbled at the bait.

"What's wrong?" the old woman asked.

"My daughter." she sighed, knowing that those two words would perk up the ears of any woman, as there was a good chance of news of a new scandal to follow.

Sensing something juicy, the old woman took the bait whole.

"What sort of trouble are you having with your daughter dear?" the elderly woman asked sympathetically, obviously gearing up to offer some sort of stock advice from her repertoire in exchange for the gossip she was going to take and run with.

"The girl's so called sensei stole her from me and dragged her out of town on a two-month "Training mission"." she said sadly. "Considering the fact that he brought a strange man along on the trip, and they had forced her to be on a team with that...boy who has already hurt her and threatened to hurt her worse, anything could be happening to her!"

"Someone stole her?" the old woman asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

"When I brought my daughter along when I went to speak to her new sensei whose name is Shimura Tetsuo in order to object to the fact that he was taking her on a two month camping trip without even so much as consulting me first, he yelled at me, saying he could do anything he wanted to her, and that there was nothing I could do about it. He then grabbed her and dragged her away, not even letting her say good-bye. When I tried to take things up with the Hokage, nobody would let me see him, and that old cripple at the Complaints Desk that I went to as a last resort was completely unhelpful." she replied, putting the right amount of drama in at the right moments.

The old woman she was talking to was appropriately shocked and scandalized by what had happened to her when she had tried to protect her little girl. Sensing that she'd run into the right person, she continued to spin her tale of woe, talking about how the old man at the Complaints desk who really should have retired long-ago since he was missing an eye and an arm and obviously needed a cane was obviously a drunk, and how he'd been completely unhelpful, and how the ninja had all given her the run around while her poor daughter was dragged further and further away from home with nothing but the clothes on her back by a pair of obvious perverts and the demon brat.

Once she was done telling her story, she sat back and watched in satisfaction as the old biddy ran off to share her newfound gossip with a group of her friends. Soon, she would have her revenge against that upstart ninja who was most likely the son of a pair of foreigners considering that accent of his, and there would be no place in the village where the Shimura family was welcome.

* * *

While Team Tetsuo and Kakashi were eating their lunches, Sakura having been forced to climb a tree and pick several apples for hers, Shimura Danzo was listening to a report that was being given to him by one of his operatives in the village about a whisper campaign that the Haruno woman had started against him and The Boy that morning, calling him an old drunk and several other uncomplimentary things to boot just because he wouldn't jump when she'd tried to order him to.

_Well, two can play that game_. he thought as he sent Koharu an invite to lunch at a rather popular restaurant which was frequented by an appropriate audience, an audience that was a damn sight more influential than the one the Haruno woman had at the moment.

The best part about it all was that he wouldn't have to tell a single lie as he spread his own little whisper campaign against the Haruno woman, one that would turn just about every ninja in Konoha against her, with the name of the poor daughter she'd been sobbing about as their rallying cry. By the time he was through, at least half of the village would be wanting to protect that poor Haruno child from her mother.

Forty-five minutes after he'd received the report from his agent, he was being seated with his fellow Council member at a table at a restaurant that was popular amongst Konoha's shinobi elite. In order to gather a discreet audience, he made sure to start in on the conversation with a bit of chatter about the Uchiha boy, being sure to make his part of the conversation loud enough to indicate that he wouldn't mind too much if people listened in because what he was talking about wasn't any sort of official secret, but anyone listening in just might find what he had to say interesting. He then moved onto the topic of Uchiha boy''s teammate, as the Weapon was always a popular topic of gossip in the village. When he was sure of his audience, he moved in on the topic which had been his purpose in partaking in the rather tasty but otherwise pointless meal which had been set before him.

"I almost feel sorry for that Haruno girl." he said with a slight sigh that was very carefully not too overdone.

"Why?" Koharu asked.

"Well, aside from the fact that her mother has been actively sabotaging her training for the last year at the very least..." he started.

"Sabotaging her training?" Koharu asked, sounding scandalized that anyone would do that to a Genin, considering how easily the poor little dears were killed off when their training wasn't sabotaged.

"I'm sure you could read between the lines in her file just as well as I have." he replied lightly. "The woman either put the girl on or encouraged the girl to go on some ridiculous weight reducing diet so she could retain her "ladylike figure" right when the girl was starting to gain some actual muscle mass. The girl's Taijutsu scores subsequently took quite a dip, and continued to get worse. If the child wasn't so intelligent, she would have lost her position as the class' Top Kunoichi then and there."

Koharu, being a Kunoichi born and raised in the old ways, looked appropriately disgusted at this, and he could feel the general disgust that was spreading amongst his barely perceptible audience, many of whom were also Kunoichi.

"If that wasn't bad enough," he continued. "When The Boy tried to get a change of scenery for his team in hopes of breaking his new students of their destructive habits, the woman had attempted to hold her back, even going so far as to delay the completion of the girl's packing for the trip until it was far too late. Since the team was on a tight mission schedule, and The Boy didn't know how fast his new students could travel, the poor girl was forced to leave the village with nothing but the clothes on her back, leaving her dependent upon the kindness of her teammates, one of whom can barely afford to feed and clothe himself, and the other of whom is notorious for being selfish and completely unhelpful in regards to his peers."

Koharu, and everyone else who was listening in for that matter, was appropriately scandalized at this. The few who had probably lost supplies on missions back when they were Genin probably found themselves remembering how their teammates had begrudged them every item they loaned them. He himself remembered how borrowing kunai from Uchiha Sasuke's great-uncle Kagami had been like pulling teeth.

"Of course, this is the same woman who chased a family with a son with a Kekkei Genkai out of the village through some sort of harassment campaign because the boy's mother accidentally tripped and knocked her over, so I shouldn't be too surprised." he finished.

He could feel the near-palpable outrage of the restaurant patrons who had been dawdling over their meals just a little too long over this, patrons who included Main Branch members of the Hyuuga clan amongst others.

_Hook, line, sinker, and success_. he thought as he indulged in a small smile.

That ought to teach the woman who had tried messing with him and The Boy. And best of all, he had just used that harpy's best weapons against her.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	7. Sparring and Sakura

The day came to an end, and as the sun was setting the boys were placing the last rail on the section of fence they had been working on that day. There was another day's worth of work left on the job but, they could take a break for the night. They needed a break for the night, as going two nights in a row with little to no sleep was generally considered to be inadvisable unless it was absolutely necessary. After a light dinner, the boys were informed that they would be sparring while Tetsuo evaluated Sakura's skills.

Naruto's Taijutsu style could be described in one word: Interesting.

Naruto's fighting style was still somewhat reminiscent of the wild and informal mess that had been there when he'd graduated the Academy but, after two years of working with Tetsuo and his teammates, a large number of the kinks had been worked out of it. He didn't waste anywhere near as much energy as he used to when he fought, which meant that he could last even longer in a battle situation or even just a spar like the one he was currently engaging in with Sasuke. His blows were far more accurate than they used to be, and his situational awareness was greatly improved when compared to two years ago, or even the year before. There was more strategy than frustration in it when he rushed at his opponent now, and he knew when to hold back and stay out of their attack range as well.

In battle, with weapons, Ninjutsu, Shadow Clones, and traps at his disposal, Naruto would be a very dangerous and very deadly opponent. In a formal spar however, where he had none of those, and wasn't allowed to try and kill his opponent, he would lose out to someone who had decided to dedicate their time to focusing more on Taijutsu, such as Lee, Suzume, or even Sasuke who had spent most of the time he wasn't eating, sleeping, or studying in his clan's private training fields. In an all-out battle, he would likely beat Sasuke as he currently was, but this wasn't a battle.

Sasuke was both shocked and angry when he managed to throw Naruto out of the makeshift ring, believing that the other boy had been holding back against him. In a way, Naruto had been but, according to the rules set down for formalized sparring, he hadn't. There had been several points where he could have potentially killed Sasuke if he'd been holding a weapon but, as that hadn't been the objective of their fight, he hadn't taken advantage of the opportunities presented. Sasuke, who was stressed a great deal by this trip amongst other things, and angered by the apparent fact that Naruto had been "holding back", decided to take his anger out on Naruto. Rather than being his usual arrogant, quietly dismissive self, the dark haired boy was yelling at Naruto for holding back against him.

"Even though I'll do better in a real fight, I'm not holding back. I'm a Trap Specialist you idiot!" Naruto replied loudly, less than a foot away from the other boy. "If you want a near-inescapable death trap, I'm your man. If you want to capture an enemy ninja without killing him, I'm also your man. Fancy fighting styles that go beyond 'See Opponent and attempt to beat the crap out of Opponent' or 'Attempt to kill Opponent before he or she kills me' however, not so much. Suzume was the team's Taijutsu specialist, and I guess you fit that role now."

Kakashi, who had been watching the spar, had briefly considered intervening but, decided to wait until one of the boys attacked the other before doing so. The two of them needed to get it out of their systems eventually if they were going to work together, and yelling was far better than letting the stress build up until you snapped. He'd been a bit worried about the Uchiha boy because he'd been so much like him at that age but, he could relax a bit now because he could see that there was someone there to start yanking him out of his shell like Obito had done for him when he and Rin joined his and Minato-sensei's team when they were nine. Hopefully, it wouldn't take a death to hammer the shell to bits when it came to the Uchiha. That had been beyond traumatic for him, and he was still dealing with the aftereffects more than a decade down the line.

In a formal sparring situation that was straight out of the Academy training ring or even a Competitive Ninjutsu match, Sasuke was good, damn good, probably even good enough to win the cup for Konoha in the Junior Division if he hadn't been an active ninja. In a real battle situation however, well...Sasuke would be pretty good for his age, top shelf Genin to low Chunin for sure but, that was about it. The thing was, there were holes in the boy's defenses that looked to be easily exploitable by anyone who was mid-Chunin level or above, or even a very lucky Genin with good aim. He could tell that Naruto had spotted them as well, as he'd seen a rather familiar expression cross the boy's face nearly every time there was an opening, an expression he'd seen on Minato-sensei's face every time he or his teammates had left themselves open during training.

Just because Sasuke was good at Taijutsu and held good scores in Ninjutsu and weapons handling didn't mean the boy was ready to become a Chunin yet. There were several things that needed to be tweaked and worked on in order to prepare the Uchiha boy for the future, and as quickly as possible, since it would be good for Konoha's public relations if the boy climbed the ranks reasonably quickly and made Jounin within the next few years. As a Jounin, Sasuke would be expected to lead missions which, at the moment, was something that could be a problem. Aside from the potential mental instability that Academy Instructor Umino Iruka and Shimura had remarked on, the Uchiha had a number of other personality problems that needed to be dealt with before the boy was anywhere near that level as well.

That wasn't to say that there weren't any ninja who were unpleasant to be around with personalities that would grate on your last nerve in Konoha's forces but, even they knew how to bend and work with the unit and take good advice when it is offered. If they didn't, three things generally happened: 1. Their careers stalled before they could attain a rank higher than Chunin and they were sidelined to a desk somewhere. 2. They washed out of the Ninja forces altogether. 3. They died. Had it not been a time of war where the number of kills in battle had become more important than many other things, it was quite possible that he himself wouldn't have gotten his promotion to Jounin when he did.

Because Shimura hadn't wanted his new students to turn into a Desk Chunin and a Cannon Fodder Genin, he had come to him begging him for help, offering the training of Naruto whom he'd noticed he was fond of as a bribe. Right now, as he watched the Uchiha scream at Naruto and Naruto yell back just as loudly, he wondered if that bribe had been worth it. Really, he could have simply snuck in the occasional lesson back at the village like he'd been doing for the last two years, and not been forced to go through the stress of dealing with the other two.

If he hadn't gone through with this however, he wouldn't have been allowed into the background of the team's official photo, and he wouldn't have gotten the neat formal pictures of himself and Naruto that they'd picked up from the developers as they were on their way out of town. While the official photo for Shimura's team had been taken at Team 5's favorite training field, his and Naruto's pictures had been taken at the one that had been most frequently used by his old team way back when, a training field he'd been told had been frequently used by the Sandaime and his students before them, and the Nidaime and his students before that. Of course dozens of other teams had used it as well, but theirs had been the three most notable.

Looking at those photos that he'd picked up on his way out of the village, he could pretend to be something other than an interloper.

* * *

Tetsuo watched Kakashi and his students sleep while he was on watch, remaining alert for any potential outside threats. He had taken the middle of the night watch shift so Sasuke and Naruto could both get several hours of unbroken sleep, since the two of them really needed it. They'd both been somewhat cranky and irritable for most of the day, and had ended the day with a spectacular argument which had gained the audience of a couple of the farm hands who could hear the yelling from all the way over in the barn. The student who worried him the most however was Sakura.

While the Haruno girl was undoubtedly brilliant, she had so many problems in other areas that he didn't even know where to begin. The girl wasn't just lacking in muscle mass, she was also below what was considered a healthy weight for her age and height, and was bordering on anorexic. Her Taijutsu was barely passable at best. Sure, it was textbook perfect but, there was little power behind the girl's blows, and nothing in the way of adaptation and innovation. The girl was accurate at throwing shuriken and kunai but, the time it took her to line up her throws which should almost be second nature by now was abysmally long, and in a real battle, she'd quite likely be killed before she could toss her first weapon.

All in all, the girl was practically an ideal Academy student but, she wasn't an ideal ninja. If the team were to encounter an actual battle situation with Sakura the way she was now, everyone would most likely be risking their lives in order to keep the girl alive. Much like the team a late friend of his had done for a now long-dead kunoichi. By the time their trip was over, that wouldn't be the case. He would make sure of it, even if it killed him to do so.

He almost regretted not allowing the girl to go home and get her pack but, since this was turning out to be a lesson in teamwork, he was content to let things remain as they were for now. The girl would most definitely be needing supplies when they headed into Wind, considering the fact that one could die of heatstroke during the day and hypothermia at night if one wasn't careful, but he could deal with that when the time came since the girl was fine for now. Naruto had loaned the girl his spare blanket and a spare outfit, and Sasuke had loaned her a kunai and a couple shuriken from his weapons pouch so she wouldn't be completely defenseless while they traveled.

As for the girl's food situation, which was a situation they were all in to a degree since there was only so much food you could pack even with storage scrolls, the Academy was supposed to teach students how to hunt small game and how to clean and prepare it as well. When it came to things other than protein, the fact that it was Autumn, and a great deal of the edible plants were dying as Winter closed in wasn't too much of a problem in Fire Country. The Shodai Hokage had been rather fond of apples, especially a variety that ripened in late Autumn, and as a result there were a shitload of apple trees growing wild across Fire Country. That, and there was going to be food provided during a couple of the missions that he'd lined up for the team so, it wasn't like the girl would starve. She'd just have to put more effort into getting food than she obviously had at any time in her life before. She'd probably even come to appreciate food more, and even drop that ridiculous diet that was currently ruining her body and her career as a result.

He was somewhat aware of the girl's other need. How could he not be when he was married and had been so for a few years? While Kakashi had bribed the cameraman who had taken the team's official photo to take a couple pictures of him and Naruto, he had gone and bought what Kunoichi used out in the field for that certain issue. Since it was washable and reusable, it wouldn't leave a trail of discarded products behind the team like the civilian method would have done. He wasn't just going to hand it to the child though, he was going to let her panic a bit and let the lesson on exactly why you should be properly packed for a mission sink in even further. He had little doubt that the bag the girl had likely prepared before her mother had dragged her to the team's rendezvous point had been rather frivolously packed, and that it was better that she left it behind. She wouldn't be learning all the wonderful lessons she'd now be learning over the next two months if she hadn't, and would likely be all the weaker because of it.

Tomorrow morning, he would be starting his new students on the tree-climbing exercise because they could spare a couple hours and still get the section of fence they were mending done by the end of the day. The morning after that, he would begin working on using Chakra to improve speed during travel, if the two who he thought would need the lesson didn't already know how, while they made their way to the Valley of the End to clean lichen off of the statues and check to see if they needed any further maintenance. That task would reinforce the tree climbing lesson, and give him a good opportunity to introduce the water-walking one as well.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	8. The New Team Medic and Visiting Mrs Har

Sakura was awoken at dawn by Naruto shaking her. The instant she realized that it was Naruto, she scrabbled backwards until she was a reasonably safe distance away from him. He'd been reasonably nice to her so far but, she was still somewhat scared of him. She'd seen firsthand that he could be dangerous when he wanted to be, and had heard that he wasn't just dangerous, he was deadly. She wasn't too certain about his mental stability either. When he was around either her, or Sasuke, he was a completely different person than how he was around that masked ninja whose name was Kakashi or her new sensei.

"Geez Sakura-san, how can you sleep through three kunai landing right by your ear?" Naruto said when she was fully awake.

She blinked, and looked. Right next to where her head had been when she'd been asleep were a trio of kunai.

"Glad to see that you're finally awake." Tetsuo-sensei said from where he was seated munching on an apple which, at that point, was more core than apple. Sasuke was already awake and seated nearby, his face wearing the expression it usually wore at the Academy but, she thought she could detect a glint of humor in his dark eyes.

"Now that everyone's awake, it's time to start training." Tetsuo-sensei said. "Naruto, Kakashi has offered to give you a few pointers on your Ninjutsu. As for you two, we will be starting on the Tree-Walking exercise if you don't know it already."

"Tree-walking?" she asked, "What is that?"

"We're going to be climbing trees without using our hands." Tetsuo-sensei replied, pointedly looking at her hands which had been scratched up a bit when she'd been forced to climb up a tree to pick her lunch and dinner because she didn't have any stored food like Naruto, Kakashi, or Tetsuo-sensei, and didn't have any ration bars like Sasuke.

"How?" she asked.

"You draw your Chakra to the soles of your feet and climb up like this. Too much, and you get blown off, too little, you don't stick." Tetsuo-sensei said as he walked over to the apple tree she'd been forced to climb the day before, walked up it, and grabbed one of the rather juicy looking apples from one of the upper limbs which she had been unable to reach. "As soon as you figure out how, you can pick your breakfast. So, I recommend that you learn fast because, you only have until nine a.m. before we have to get to work."

She swallowed at that last statement and the prospect of going hungry as she moved to the tree, determined to at least get this one thing right. She'd seen the disappointed look that her sensei had constantly tried to cover up as he evaluated her skills and found them lacking, despite the fact that she had been the top of her year, yesterday evening. Right now, it looked like Sasuke-kun was right when he called her useless.

Much to her surprise, she somehow managed to get it right the first time, and she was able to pick one of the apples that had eluded her the day before because she'd been afraid of falling if she climbed too high. As she took a bite of the apple that was her prize for success, a faint whistle from below caught her attention.

"Would you look at that," Tetsuo-sensei said as he gazed up at her. "Perfect Chakra control."

She felt a small surge of pride at this. It would seem that she possessed at least one talent of worth. While perfect Chakra control wasn't exactly rare, it wasn't exactly common either. Most Ninja got by on average to above average Chakra control. Perfect Chakra control was more common in females than it was in males, which made it more likely that she would have it but, no-one had pointed out that she had it back at the Academy, so she didn't think she did.

"Get down here." Tetsuo-sensei said from where he was watching Sasuke struggle to climb his side of the tree. She complied, wondering what he wanted.

"Congratulations." Tetsuo-sensei said when she reached him. "You're our new team Medic. Or at least you will be after Kakashi gives you some training."

Tetsuo-sensei reached up to his vest and opened one of the scroll pockets and caught the scroll that dropped out of it. He then unfurled the scroll that he had retrieved from said pocket, which turned out to be a storage scroll, and released a small bag with a strap.

"You'd better not lose this. Not only will I be forced to pay for it but, the guys over in Supply will have my head if you do." he said as he handed the bag over to her.

When she opened the bag, she found that it was full of medical supplies. Despite the fact that she'd taken the standard First-Aid course at the Academy, she felt slightly lost and somewhat overwhelmed as she looked at the immediately available contents of the kit that weren't placed in the storage scrolls which were also neatly packed into the kit. That was probably because this wasn't a standard First-Aid kit like the ones just about every Academy student and Ninja was expected to carry on them at all times. This was a kit like the one at the Academy that no-one was allowed to touch unless it was a serious emergency, as in the person needs to be stabilized here and now or they'll die on the way to the hospital type of emergency.

How was she supposed to be team Medic? She didn't even know what to do with even half of the things that were in the bag...

"What's this for?" she asked as she held up a black bordered storage scroll that didn't seem to have anything stored in it when she unfurled it to see what might be inside.

"Pray you never have to use it." was all Tetsuo-sensei said in reply. The strange thing was, he had placed his hand on one of the scroll pockets on his vest when he did so.

What was so terrible about a seemingly empty storage scroll that it would provoke that sort of response?

* * *

While Sakura was becoming acquainted with the contents of a medkit that contained everything from bandages to a complete field surgical kit with which one could perform say an eye transplant or an emergency appendectomy for instance if one had the training, which she most definitely did not, her mother was back in Konoha cleaning house. As the woman dusted the furniture, she heard a knock on the door. When she went to answer it, it was to find one of her shinobi neighbors on the doorstep holding a dish which contained a berry cobbler.

Having rarely interacted with the woman aside from occasionally trading greetings in the marketplace, she was briefly puzzled as to why she was there. Then, she realized that her story had apparently gotten around, and that the other woman, who was apparently a decent sort of ninja unlike her poor daughter's sensei, had visited because she was feeling sympathy for her plight. This would of course advance her plans to have that Shimura bastard drummed out of the shinobi forces, as word of what a terrible ninja he was spread amongst their ranks. As she invited the Kunoichi in, the woman offered her the cobbler which she had brought as a gift.

Eventually, the two of them fell to talking, conversing as if they were old friends, and sharing the cobbler the other woman had brought with her. The woman whose name was Kiko turned out to be an excellent conversationalist, and had shared several anecdotes about raising ninja of her own. Eventually, the conversation was brought around to Sakura's diet, with questions about what the Academy Instructors had had to say about it, and what she herself had thought about it.

"I got some rather rude notes from that Umino fellow who we all know is that demon brat's friend but, that Mizuki fellow was far nicer, and even gave me a few tips to help it along." she replied, remembering how nice Mizuki had been during that one Parent/Teacher meeting, unlike that other instructor who she'd heard was friends with the demon brat. "I was a bit worried about how little she was eating, but I must admit that she was getting a little...bulky before she went on it."

It was at that point that her neighbor had looked at her watch, and had been surprised by the time. After apologizing several times for her abrupt departure, she left, leaving Barako to resume the cleaning that had been interrupted by her visit.

* * *

As Takamura Kiko made her way to her favorite watering hole for a much needed drink and a bit of gossip, she wondered how she had managed to keep the disgust off of her face throughout her entire visit with the Haruno woman. While the Haruno girl's problems may not have entirely been her mother's fault, the woman was responsible for the vast majority of them. Most of the talk in the conversation she'd had with the woman about her daughter Sakura's training had been about how this, that, and the other, was completely unladylike.

There was a reason that it was a very bad thing when a traitor got a teaching position at the Academy. While the damage done to the students' training was generally minimal amongst the children from shinobi families, it was catastrophic amongst those of civilian origin and orphans who didn't have anyone at home to train them. Knowing about the existence of the traitor, it was no surprise that the only civilian born student who had made it that year had been the one that had practically been trained by a Yamanaka.

It was clear that at least one of the Academy instructors had been trying to do right by that poor Haruno child, but the stupid woman had ignored his advice in favor of that from the traitor because of the instructor's association with the Uzumaki boy. Because that stupid bint had listened to the traitor, the poor Haruno child's training had suffered far more than it should have. It was amazing that the girl had managed to get as far as she had.

As for the other issue, she couldn't believe the woman was stupid enough to go up against the Shimura family. Based on everything she'd heard, Shimura Danzo, who was the head of the family, was dangerous as hell, had always been, and would be until the day he died in his sleep at an incredibly old age that would be a great deal older than the impressively old age he was at now. Considering his current age and the fact that he wasn't listed as retired, she she'd shit herself and run if she found herself in opposition with the elder Shimura. It was quite probable that the only reason that the foolish woman who had decided to try smearing dirt on his good family name was still alive was because the man wanted to completely ruin her before he killed her in a manner that couldn't be traced back to him but would serve as a warning to the next idiot who was foolish enough to even consider messing with him.

Hopefully, the twit's poor daughter wouldn't end up being collateral damage when the old man moved in for the kill.

When she got to the bar which she didn't usually visit this early in the day unless she'd gotten off of an extremely stressful mission and needed to unwind a bit in good company before she got home or otherwise would snap, there was a bit of a crowd of night-owls who would most likely be going home to sleep when they left. Despite the fact that Ninja often tended to hang out in bars, there were surprisingly few Ninja alcoholics considering. One of the reasons for this is that the first thing any competent instructor teaches their students when they reached an age at which they might start drinking was how to limit oneself, and that it is a very, very, bad idea to use alcohol as a crutch. Visiting a bar however, especially the sort of bar that contains exceedingly cheap and easily throwable furniture, was a good way to let off steam.

"Y'aren't the usual morning crowd." an older man, who was undoubtedly a regular, said as she seated herself at the bar.

"Just got back from visiting the Haruno woman. It's as bad as I heard. Worse, considering the fact that she tried to turn me against the Shimura family." she replied as she signaled for a drink, preferably a strong one. "I'd hate to see what'll happen to that poor girl if that stupid woman continues her power struggle with Danzo, since she's caught in the middle of it."

The old man made a face at this.

"Danzo?" the old man said incredulously, apparently just as shocked as she had been that someone could be that stupid if non moreso. "That woman's messing with Danzo? I'm amazed she's still alive. I was just a little pipsqueak back during the First War, but I saw him in action then. Crossing him is a really bad idea. It'd be quicker, easier, and a darn sight less messy to just turn a Lightning Jutsu on yourself instead."

**Edited 10-5-12.**


	9. Medics and Termination

All too soon, the morning's training was over, and it was time to get a start on the day's work which they were being paid for. Today however, rather than it just being Naruto and Sasuke doing all the work, Sakura, who had recovered from the hike, would be working as well.

"So, you're team Medic then, huh?" Naruto said to Sakura when he'd returned from trying to learn an exercise that was supposed to help him with his Elemental Manipulation and saw her fiddling with a tricked out First-Aid kit, packing away all of the supplies that she'd taken out and messed with. Without even testing him, Kakashi had been convinced that his primary element was Wind, and had started him training accordingly. He complied because whether or not his primary affinity was actually Wind, the training in that element would only help him in the long run.

"But what if I don't want to..." Sakura trailed off as she carelessly crammed a black-bordered scroll that was bringing back bad memories into the bag.

"Look," he said, "Nobody's going to force you to become an Iryou-nin once you're off the team but, every team needs at least someone with a bit of medical training with them. You happen to be the best person to take that position for this team."

"But what about..." Sakura started, ready to point out that Naruto was better than her at just about everything when it came to being a ninja, so he would more than likely be better qualified than her in this as well.

"Sasuke-kun?" Naruto sneered, as he waved his hand at the tree that the other boy was struggling to climb despite the fact that he should be packing it in and heading over to the fence right now.

"You could..." she started, surprised, and yet not all that surprised that Naruto had misinterpreted her question. Sasuke-kun was still the best in her eyes, and she'd marry him someday, and Naruto, who had had a crush on her back when he was at the Academy, knew that.

"No, I can't." Naruto said somewhat bitterly. "I can bandage wounds, set bones, give stitches in a pinch if you don't mind the scar looking a little ugly, and about a dozen other things, but I cannot do Medical Ninjutsu."

"Why not?" she asked.

"Aside from the slight Chakra control issue that probably won't get sorted out in my lifetime?" Naruto said, as if said Chakra control issue was patently obvious to everyone. "There's an element to my Chakra that makes such things generally inadvisable. That of course leaves you, as you have better Chakra control than even Kakashi who's merely "Exceptional"."

Naruto turned and left at that, not waiting for Sakura to finish packing her bag. The girl didn't know it, but she had brought up issues that he'd rather not deal with with her questioning, and not just Kyuubi issues, though, as he'd recently learned, it was the Kyuubi which prevented him from being able to do Medical Ninjutsu without putting his patient's life at risk.

At the beginning of the year, after what had happened to his and Kurosaki's teams, he had intently studied anything associated with medicine he could get his hands on for a few months, which had been something he wouldn't have been able to do if Tetsuo-sensei hadn't made him learn how to read properly. Following the recommendations of a particularly useful scroll, he began getting practice in the practical aspects of the medical field by working on any and every injured animal he could find in and around Konoha, not caring that he got pecked, scratched, and bitten more times than he could count in the process. While he could clean and bandage wounds, and splint broken limbs and the like, he could not properly do a Medical Ninjutsu like the ones outlined in the books and scrolls. Every time he tried, something would go wrong. His Chakra would fluctuate in the middle of things, the wound would simply fail to start healing or, worse, everything would seem to go right, right up until the animal he'd been working on died for no discernible reason.

Konohamaru, who had sometimes worked as his assistant, was just as sad as him or moreso every time he he had failed to save one of the wounded creatures he'd gathered up from the woods, the parks, and sometimes just around town. Because the younger boy showed his emotions more openly as he was still young enough to be able to wear his heart on his sleeve, he'd had to wipe tears off of the child's face a number of times before the day he'd finally quit playing veterinarian. The boy who had latched onto him for some strange reason after he'd nearly killed him in front of his grandfather had been much happier when he'd taken to playing ninja with him instead

The reason he'd stopped working on animals had been because he'd been forced to quit after he and Konohamaru had been arrested while they were learning everything they didn't want to know about childbirth from a Nara deer. The Old Man had given him a lecture he wouldn't forget anytime soon before turning him over to the Nara for punishment. Fortunately for him, the head of the Nara clan was a laid back and understanding individual. Rather than demanding his head on a platter because he'd been hanging around in an off-limits section of the Nara property and might've spooked one of the deer that earned the clan their income, Shikaku had made him clean the deer pens that were reserved for sick deer for a week since he was "So interested in them". Deer poop had moved up several places on his list of dislikes after that.

* * *

As Sasuke pounded yet another nail into yet another board, he continued trying to regain the equilibrium he'd lost rather violently a couple of days ago when Umino Iruka had announced the team assignments. Rather than things remaining pretty much the same for him after graduating the Academy like he'd somewhat expected them to, his entire world had been tipped on its ear.

First of all, he had been dragged out of the village practically the instant he'd been placed on his new team, taking him away from all that was familiar, in order to do menial tasks at a farm in the middle of nowhere. The journey to said farm had been arduous and, rather than being the top dog and teachers' favorite on the team like he had been at the Academy, he was a distant second in both power, and his teacher's affections. Instead of catering to him like the Instructors at the Academy had done, his new sensei had paid attention to him only long enough to point out something he was doing wrong before turning back to the Uzumaki.

That in itself was another interesting reversal. Rather than being held up as a failure and an example of what not to do as he had been back at the Academy, the Uzumaki was held up as an example of what a ninja should be. He understood why though. After coming from something that was even worse than an ordinary civilian background, and being either ignored or outright sabotaged by his Instructors, the Uzumaki, who had had nobody to help him or train him but himself, had managed to secure an early graduation. After graduation, the boy continued to rise, showing that with help and training, he could become something exceptional, something that had the natural potential to match or even beat That Man, were he placed in the right hands.

Himself however...Despite all of his best efforts, he was topping out at just slightly above average for a shinobi of his clan. He remembered how instead of comparing him to Him, and Shisui, his relatives had compared him to someone called Obito when they thought he wasn't listening back before IT had happened. When he'd gone through the old clan records, he'd found that Obito had been a clansman who had died in the Third War at the age of thirteen, and had activated his Sharingan at that age as well. About the only thing he didn't have to match Obito's record was an early graduation and the rank of Chunin, even if both didn't really count because they'd been earned in a time of war, which tended to lower the bar for such things. He'd most likely have to wait until he was thirteen before he activated his Sharingan if ever as well, considering how things were progressing.

Rather depressingly, about the only thing that remained the same in his life since his graduation was that the pink haired girl continued trying to get his attention. Now however, she didn't do it as much, because she hadn't been given the time to do so by their sensei who seemed intent on running the both of them into the ground.

* * *

Haruno Kita felt unaccountably nervous as he was called into his boss' office. He'd served as an accountant at Konoha's main bank since the tail end of the last war. In all those years, nobody had had any complaints about his performance. Normally, he wouldn't be worried, but he had been getting some rather strange looks from his co-workers yesterday evening, and all of this morning as well.

"You wanted to see me sir?" he said as he entered the reasonably well appointed office which belonged to his boss, who was a retired shinobi, which was something that showed in his decorating habits.

He found himself staring straight ahead at the well-used sword that was mounted on the wall behind his boss' desk, a sword that had seen action during the Second Shinobi World War, as he waited for his boss to respond.

"Haruno-san, you're a hard worker, a good employee all-round, and an asset to the bank, which makes it all the more difficult to do this." his boss said, looking at him with an expression of pity. "But, I've been forced to terminate your employment. The vast majority of our customers are ninja, and if they don't have faith in our employees..."

"But why?" he asked, wondering what he'd done wrong.

Had he accidentally said something that a civilian wouldn't think twice about but a ninja would find offensive due to the fact that certain words had taken on a different meaning because of their use in euphemisms? Had it been because he had spilled ink on that one form? It hadn't been all that much, just a little dark blot in the corner that was barely noticeable and didn't obscure any of the figures.

"I'm afraid you'll have to ask your wife about that." his boss eventually replied. "You will be given until the end of Lunch to clear out your desk."

After clearing out a desk on and in which bits and pieces of nearly fifteen years of his life had accumulated, he despondently headed home, wondering what he would do for work now that his family had somehow fallen out of favor with the village ninja, which was practically the kiss of death in Konoha. His wife was there eating a lunch she had prepared for herself when he arrived.

"Dear," he said when he entered the dining room of their small home. "Do you have any idea about why I was fired?"

"WHAT? !" his wife screeched.

"Apparently, we've lost favor with the ninjas, and my boss, my former boss, told me that it had something to do with you." he replied, hoping and praying that it was all some sort of big misunderstanding. His wife wouldn't be stupid enough to do something like that, would she?

"That is it!" his wife yelled, dashing his hopes. "That Shimura bastard is so dead!"

Shimura? Where had he...? Oh, yeah...Holy crap! His wife had pissed off that creepy guy that he thought was going to eat him when he was little.

He remembered that day. He'd been six, and his mother, who had gone to the capitol to visit that one aunt he'd hated, had asked one of her friends from work to watch him because he had the chicken pox. That man, who had bandages over one of his eyes, had been big and scary and very, very, strict. The Hokage had dropped by to visit the man and see how he was doing since he'd apparently just gotten out of the hospital, and had talked to him too for a while which was nice. What wasn't so nice had been what happened when the man had caught him trying to steal a couple of extra treats from the jar in the pantry. The smile the man had given him after he'd told him that the scary story his friends had told him about him was true had haunted his nightmares for years afterwards.

That had also been the day that he'd decided that he didn't want to be a ninja.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	10. The Rabbit

"Thanks for doing this." Tetsuo said to Kakashi as the group minus one sat down to dinner, thanking him once more for going along with this insane situation and not turning around and running back to Konoha after the first night, which was something that would have been well within the man's rights to do since he'd volunteered for this.

"You're welcome." Kakashi replied.

As far as Kakashi was concerned, things weren't ideal, but they were reasonably good at the moment. Sasuke, who had started attacking the apple tree again the instant the team was done with the fence, was too tired to yell at Naruto the way he did the day before, and Sakura was off trying her hand at catching one of the wild rabbits that lived nearby for dinner, meaning that the meal was reasonably quiet and not as tense as Lunch had been. He wasn't Naruto's sensei, like he had promised Minato-sensei he would be, but he had been allowed to teach the boy by Naruto's sensei. Considering how territorial Jounin tended to be about their students, this in and of itself was quite remarkable.

That morning, he'd had a rather enjoyable lesson with the boy, and had gotten to know him a bit better. The morning lesson was bittersweet however because, as he'd noticed every time he'd encountered him, Naruto was a cross between both of his parents, and not just in the looks department. One minute, Naruto would be like Minato-sensei, and the next, he'd be like Kushina-san. And, sometimes, he'd somehow be like both of them at the same time. Seeing Naruto up close and interacting with him was painful because there were any number of reminders of what he'd lost in any given time span.

As he ate one of his stored pre-cooked meals which he was probably going to run out of long before they got to the missions during which food would be provided, he thought he heard sobbing coming from the nearby trees of the forest which grew right up to the property line of the farm they were camped at the edges of. A camping situation that was somewhat unusual considering the mission he was currently on.

Normally, if a mission like the one they'd been assigned to was going to last more than a day, the people who they were working for would offer them a place to sleep indoors, be it in their house, or the barn. Here however, no invite had come, and he suspected that it was because the farm was being used for more than farming, and that whatever was going on here was beyond Genin-level clearance. Either that, or they'd been invited inside, and Shimura had refused in order to toughen the Haruno girl up and get her used to sleeping outdoors before the cold weather really set in.

Noticing that, perhaps beside him, only Naruto, who had senses that rivaled those of an Inuzuka, had heard the crying, he decided to get up and go investigate in case the Haruno girl had gotten herself injured and couldn't deal with her wound or drag herself back to the camp, and was currently bleeding to death or something. When he reached the source of the crying, it was to find that the Haruno girl was sitting in front of a snare in which a rabbit had been caught, holding the kunai Sasuke had loaned her and crying. Rather than being dead as the case usually was when a Genin cried over their first kill, the rabbit was alive and struggling to escape.

Great, unless he wanted to completely waste the time it took to get out here, and walk back to camp to ask Shimura to deal with this, it was up to him to give the lesson on the difference between pets and food. He still remembered the lecture that Minato-sensei had given Obito the first time the boy had been forced to hunt for their dinner...

Obito, despite being good enough to make Chunin, hadn't entirely been suited to the shinobi lifestyle. He'd been far too kind and gentle, and had far too much respect for living things, much like that Chunin who'd taken a teaching position at the Academy after he'd accidentally gotten a teammate killed because he'd had a little too much sympathy for the enemy. That wasn't to say that Obito had never killed anyone however. It had been a time of war back then, and their team, like just about every other team that was active at the time, had fought. Obito hadn't liked killing one bit though, and had been upset every time he'd been forced to do it.

Pulling himself out of his introspection, he deliberately stepped on a twig that was lying on the ground in order to gain the Haruno girl's attention, since she hadn't already noticed his presence.

"What's wrong?" he asked the girl when she whirled around to see who was there.

"I can't..." the girl choked out, tears streaming down her face as she gestured to the rabbit which was still feebly trying to escape.

"Why not?" he asked.

"It's a poor defenseless creature!" the girl exclaimed, shocked that he couldn't see what to her, with her still all too innocent eyes, was self-evident.

"Sometimes you'll have to." he replied, meaning more than the rabbit, oh so much more. There had been missions that had left him puking his guts out afterwards, missions no sane man would want to take, missions he'd been forced to complete despite these facts. Not all of the assassination missions that he had been assigned to over the years were for adults, and not all of the adults he'd killed had been guilty of anything. Konoha didn't generally accept such missions but, sometimes...There was more than one reason that ANBU was called the "Dark Side".

"But..." the girl started, probably about to reiterate her point about the rabbit being a defenseless woodland creature. That's what you got when you raised children on cutesy stories about talking magic rabbits and such. He'd seen those stupid brightly colored books that were so popular amongst the civilian children and some ninja children as well, books that Obito and Rin had been raised reading, every time he'd wandered into the bookstore to pick up a new copy of Icha Icha Paradise.

"Do you want to starve?" he asked, as that was what it would eventually come down to if she kept letting the creatures she was hunting go.

"No!" the girl, who'd obviously never been hunting before in her entire life despite the fact that the Academy was supposed to cover these things, replied.

"It's not a pet Sakura." he said, telling the girl what she needed to hear rather than whatever trite platitude she had likely wanted to hear. "If you let this one go, you'll be more likely to let the next go, and the next, until you really do starve. In this situation, the best you can do is thank it for the sacrifice it made for your continued survival, and put it out of its misery."

"Misery?" she asked.

"You've got it stuck in the trap, and have had it stuck in the trap for an unnecessarily long time. It's frightened and in pain." he said, pointing out what was obvious to him, and should have been obvious to her. "If you'd ended it when you found it, it wouldn't have had to suffer while you sat there dithering over whether or not to kill it. Doing what you're doing right now is far crueler than killing it when you found it would have been."

The girl paled over the idea of having caused the rabbit unnecessary pain, much like Obito had when he'd caught his first kill aside from a bit of fishing, and Minato-sensei had told him something similar. For some reason, killing mammals was far worse in people's minds than killing fish, reptiles, and/or amphibians.

"Could you...?" the girl asked, moving to hand her borrowed kunai over to him.

"No." he replied, refusing the weapon. "This is something you have to do."

He wasn't going to coddle the girl like her civilian parents had. Doing so wouldn't do her any favors in the long run, and would more than likely get her killed at some point in the future. She had chosen to be a ninja, and it was best to have her face the realities of what it was to be one early on, and rid herself of her romantic illusions about life as a ninja before she found herself in an actual life-or-death situation. Those who got coddled because they were children, those whose sensei did all of the hunting and cleaning of game for them because they were squeamish about it, broke after their first experience with death out in the field more often than those who hadn't. She wouldn't learn if he or her other teammates did all the killing for her.

"I'm sure the Academy went over all of the vital points, including the best ones for ending things quickly." he said before standing back and waiting for the girl to get it over with.

The girl sobbed as she raised her kunai, and in seconds it was all over, and the rabbit's suffering was at an end. He gave the girl a few more minutes to cry, much as Minato-sensei had done for Obito. Taking a life, any life, for the first time was a hard thing to do. After a set amount of time however, he made the girl get up and head back to the team's campsite, bringing her kill with her. It wouldn't do to let the meat go to waste, otherwise the rabbit's death became pointless.

As it turned out, whoever taught Sakura how to prepare her game for cooking was a total idiot. After watching the girl fumble with the animal for several minutes, he sat down next to her and taught her the right way.

* * *

Sakura felt sick, but she forced herself to eat.

After the rabbit she'd caught and killed had been cooked, she had picked at it, taken a bite, and started to set it aside, unable to eat as the guilt of having killed the creature, and the disgust she'd felt as she'd skinned it and cleaned it had made her feel physically ill. She'd never been forced to do something like this before. During the survival class back at the Academy, one of the boys had tended to those tasks, and had passed out the meat after it had all been cooked.

When Kakashi had caught her setting the rabbit aside, he had scolded her and asked her what she'd killed it for if she hadn't intended on eating it. He then ordered her to start eating, and sat there to make sure she did so. He was still sitting there and watching her, as was the rest of the team.

When she'd set out to catch her dinner, she'd only had a vague idea as to how it would go. She knew intellectually that she would have to kill whatever animal she caught and cook it, but she hadn't realized what doing so was really like. The reason she'd been hunting had been because she had gotten sick of apples after lunch, had told her sensei as much, and her sensei had suggested that she go out and catch some dinner since the nearby woods were full of game. If she had known it would be like this, she would have happily stuck to the apples.

The snare had been textbook perfect, and she had been proud of it, much as she had been proud of the grade she had gotten when she'd made a similar snare in the Academy survival class. It had been when the snare had caught the small, defenseless rabbit and she'd realized what she had to do to it that the pride had gone out the window. She then found that she couldn't bring herself to kill the creature, and had cried at the thought of having to do so. She had sat there crying as the rabbit struggled in the snare unable to escape until Kakashi had found her and told her that because of her hesitation she had made the rabbit suffer far worse than it would have if she'd just ended it in the first place.

For some strange reason, she had a feeling that Kakashi hadn't just been talking about the rabbit earlier. She didn't know what else he could have been talking about or why though.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	11. Sasuke

Sasuke got up at dawn to tackle the tree again, determined to get it right. Somehow, he had fallen behind even Sakura in this, despite the fact that it seemed to be a most basic ninja skill considering the number of odd places he'd seen ninja get scolded for standing in and walking across over the years. Oddly enough, like most people, he'd barely noticed it, took it for granted, and never gave exactly how his relatives and the other ninja of the village had been able to run up the sides of buildings and such a second thought. Until now, when it was his turn to do the same, that was.

The pink haired Haruno girl had swiftly discovered the secret to the technique, which was much harder than it looked, and had gotten all the way to the top of this very tree that he was attempting to climb on her first try. He however could only barely make it half-way up the tree before his Chakra either spiked or dipped, and he either slipped or was blown off as Shimura had warned him would happen. Both Sakura and the Uzumaki had tried to give him pointers but he'd shrugged them off, determined to make it on his own.

He would prove that he could do this without their help, especially without the Uzumaki's. He needed to grow stronger, and he couldn't do that if people were constantly helping him, and not letting him learn how to do things on his own. He knew this because that had been the topic of one of the major arguments about him between his father and That Man which he'd overheard back before...before IT had happened. His father had been right back then when he'd said that he needed to learn how to do things on his own, and was still right now. If people were constantly helping him, he would never learn. If he couldn't learn, he couldn't grow powerful. If he couldn't grow powerful, he wouldn't become strong enough to defeat Him. If he couldn't defeat Him, he will have failed to avenge his clan.

Since he didn't want to fail and let his clan down, he couldn't accept the help that the Uzumaki and the Haruno girl had offered out of whatever sense of pity they felt for him. That pity that led to a desire to "help" was one of the reasons he generally despised the Instructors back at the Academy as well. After IT had happened, the lot of them had started coddling him and offering extra help with his lessons. Heck, even random shinobi off the street had offered to help him afterward but, they generally quit after a while, unlike the Academy Instructors. Usually, he did everything to ignore the Instructors outside of lessons because of this but, if what the Instructors had offered to teach him seemed useful however, he would take what he learned from the initial lesson he generally couldn't escape from, and do his best to learn the rest of it on his own.

Before he could get past the high mark he'd made the evening before, his new sensei called him down from the tree in order to pack up their makeshift camp and get going towards their next mission. He honestly didn't know how he felt about the man whom he couldn't lump in with his Academy Instructors and despise on those grounds, since the man hadn't tried to cater to him out of some misguided sense of pity or, the greedy hope that he would share whatever power he attained when he grew up with his "beloved sensei". On the one hand, the man had shown him how to do something and gave him the chance to learn how to do it properly on his own rather than coddling him and giving him a bunch of extra tips and pointers, and trying to hold his hand all the way up the tree. On the other however, the man had a tendency to ignore him in favor of the other two, and he hated being ignored. In truth, he didn't despise the man, but he didn't like him all that much either.

Sighing, he dropped back to the ground the way he'd been trained to do when jumping or falling from a great height when he was younger and made his way over to where everyone was getting ready to leave. Kakashi, the Uzumaki, and his new sensei were packing their belongings into storage scrolls, and Sakura was eating a few bites of cold left-over rabbit while sitting next to the blanket in which her spare outfit had been folded. So far, the girl had resisted wearing the outfit that the Uzumaki had loaned her, but she wouldn't be able to do so for much longer, because the outfit she was wearing was starting to get rather ripe, and the people whose fence they'd just repaired wouldn't let her inside to use the washer, or anything else for that matter.

Thanks to the last couple of days, he had learned that girls didn't naturally smell like flowers or cooked food like just about every girl or woman he'd encountered in the village, including his mother, generally did. In fact, when they didn't get a shower for a while, they smelled pretty much like boys did when they were in the same situation, and that was unpleasant. Apparently, the flower smell came from one of those beauty products that he'd overheard a number of girls and women talking about on occasion when he encountered the odd conversation that wasn't about him.

That was a lesson that he could have done without.

As soon as everyone was packed, they started on their way towards the Valley of the End, which was in the completely opposite direction from Konoha than the farm they had been at. Fortunately, they had a couple days in which to get there, rather than less than one as they had had on the journey to the farm. During the trip, both Kakashi and his new sensei started giving him and Sakura lessons on moving Chakra to limbs in order to move faster. This had been touched on at the Academy but, had not been part of the general curriculum, and therefore, he'd pretty much ignored it.

Since he hadn't gotten the Tree-walking exercise down, the team did not take to the trees like Shinobi often did in Fire country when they were traveling long distances, as leaping from tree to tree through Fire Country's vast forests was much quicker than walking, as one covered far more distance in a jump than they would striding across the same distance on the ground, and passed over obstacles that they would have generally been forced to walk around. Since they had to walk on the ground because he couldn't take to the trees, they had to keep to established roads and trails rather than going in a straight line across the country through the "Treetop Highway", which naturally added a great deal of time to their trip. This meant that instead of Sakura holding them back, as she previously had when they had to slow down for her on the hike to the farm, it was him that was holding the team back back. Though he didn't show it, this stung.

Because he was spending a great deal of time and energy on the lessons in channeling Chakra to his limbs to improve speed, he couldn't spend as much time on the Tree-Walking lesson because, that would risk slowing the team down even further due to the possibility of his developing a case of severe Chakra Exhaustion from doing so, if it didn't force them to return to Konoha entirely. While he seemed to get reasonably good results in the evening, and was more prone to slipping off the tree he selected than blowing off of it, he didn't get the same results in the morning when he was somewhat refreshed after a night of sleep. This of course frustrated him to no end.

Eventually, after a couple days of walking, during which he had started hunting for his dinner like Sakura because, he'd gotten sick of the rations he had packed, which were nutritious and little else, they finally reached the Valley of the End. He did his best to keep the awe he felt when he got his first view of the Valley off of his face. Impressive didn't even begin to cover it. There was a massive scar in the land which had been created in the titanic struggle between the Shodai Hokage, and his noble ancestor Uchiha Madara when his ancestor had tried and failed to wrest the title of Hokage from the Senju. A scar in the land which marked the boundary between the Land of Fire and the Land of Sound which, up until recently, had been the Land of the Rice Paddies. At the far end of the Valley which had been created by the Kyuubi was a waterfall that was flanked by a pair of statues that stood facing each other, each with a hand held up in the Sign of Confrontation, Senju Hashirama's statue standing in the Land of Fire, and Uchiha Madara's statue standing in the Land of Sound.

"Dibs on the Madara statue!" the Uzumaki exclaimed as he broke from the group and raced towards the statues, breaking the awed silence that had fallen upon the team when they had reached the Valley and got their first look at it.

Odd, he would've thought that the Uzumaki would have wanted to tend to the statue of the Shodai Hokage, considering his stated goal of becoming Hokage...

"Why?" Kakashi asked, sounding shocked.

Apparently, he wasn't the only one who expected the Uzumaki to leave someone else to clean Uchiha Madara's statue while he lovingly tended to that of the Shodai Hokage, most likely him because, he was a Uchiha, and therefore related to the man who had tried and failed to usurp the First Hokage after helping found the village with him.

"Madara's...Well, he isn't exactly a hero of mine, but I admire him." the Uzumaki replied.

"Why?!" Kakashi yelled, sounding even more shocked.

He himself was a bit surprised to find that someone in Konoha outside his now dead clan viewed Madara in a positive light as well, but he wasn't nearly as startled as Kakashi seemed to be. Something about Kakashi's shock seemed to go beyond the sort of reaction he thought was normal when someone mentioned liking someone whom history viewed as a villain though. Sakura looked a bit surprised herself by the Uzumaki's statement, but nowhere near as shocked as Kakashi. Their sensei however acted as if this was all old news to him, something he'd heard a hundred times before.

"That man was beyond devious. If it weren't for that whole thing with the Shodai Hokage, he would have set the standard for Traps. His traps within traps were works of art, and he could do things with shock tags that were beyond amazing." the Uzumaki replied sounding genuinely admiring.

This answer seemed to placate Kakashi who gave the Uzumaki a fond pat on the head, which was odd because, he didn't seem the sort to give such gestures of affection. At least, he hadn't shown a propensity for doing so before, not to him or Sakura whom people were more likely to attempt to give such gestures of affection to.

The Uzumaki then ran over to the statues and started the day's work, racing up and down the Madara statue, using a variant of the Tree-Walking exercise he had not yet mastered to his and his sensei's satisfaction, critically examining it for any damage that may need to be repaired. Despite its remote location, the Valley of the End was considered to be one of Konoha's historical heritage sites, therefore the statues were generally kept in good repair and, from what he'd been told, cleaned and examined every few months. They were this quarter's cleaning and examining team, and they were being given C-ranked pay for this despite the fact that it was a D-ranked mission since the job was outside the village walls.

Determined not to be outdone, he started climbing the statue on the opposing side of the river from the one that Naruto was scurrying about on, and got much higher on it than he'd ever done before on any of the trees. During the brief surge of elation over his success however, there was a spike in his Chakra, and he found himself being blown from the statue, like he'd often been blown from a tree when he got higher than his previous high point. Before he could prepare himself for a landing that wouldn't kill him, the Uzumaki grabbed him out of the air and, in several hops, brought him back down to the ground.

"Let me go!" he yelled, angry and embarrassed that he'd had to be rescued like a small child, rescued by the Uzumaki like he'd been rescued by That Man every time he'd bitten off just a little more than he could chew during training. He didn't need anymore reminders of his failure.

"I don't want or need your help!" he yelled as he pushed the Uzumaki away. If it weren't for the fact that he hadn't gotten his chance to avenge the clan, he would have rather died than been helped by the Uzumaki. He knew that he was weak, he just didn't need his face rubbed in it every time he tried to prove what little strength he had.

Rather than fussing over him like That Man would've done in a similar situation, and he half expected the Uzumaki to do, the Uzumaki just gave him a look that he couldn't quite decipher and walked off. It was at that point that his sensei grabbed him, checked him for injuries, and set him to cleaning the base of the statues, ordering him not to try climbing them until he had the Tree-Walking exercise mastered to his satisfaction.

He hated them. He hated them all. That pink haired harpy that wouldn't leave him alone, Kakashi who pretty much hung back and ignored him, his "Sensei" who pretty much ignored him unless he wanted to point out something that he was doing wrong, and most of all the Uzumaki who should have been beneath him but wasn't, the Uzumaki who was standing above him as an example of what he should be instead of what he was, like That Man had.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	12. Sakura

Sakura sobbed as she looked at her reflection in the water of the river that flowed from the base of the waterfall at the far end of the Valley of the End. She was completely hideous! Her hair was a mass of tangles because she hadn't had her comb on her because she'd left it in the bag she'd left at home, her face was smudged with dirt, and her lips were beginning to get chapped. That didn't even begin to cover the state of her nails, or the fact that there were smudges of dirt on her hands, arms, and legs, and the fact that there was dried blood on her left leg because she'd skinned her knee which was now scabbed. Her clothes, which were the horrendous bright orange ones that Naruto lent her were absolutely filthy, and helped make her smell worse than she looked.

Tetsuo-sensei had let her bathe and wash her clothes instead of making her clean the statues like she was supposed to be doing because he was tired of smelling her. Instead of taking her somewhere reputable where she could properly get clean, he had told her to "Pick a spot on the river, but don't wander off too far". She didn't know how she was going to do this though, since the water was freezing, and she had no soap with which to clean herself, her clothing, or her blanket which was beginning to smell rather rank as well. When she'd pointed this out earlier, Tetsuo-sensei had told her that she had to work with what she had, not what she wished she had, that people got by without soap for centuries, and that she could do so now.

When she had pointed out that she wouldn't have anything to wear while her clothes dried, Naruto had just given her a look as if there was a solution that was so obvious that a toddler would get it, and that since she didn't get it, she was less intelligent than a toddler, before digging into his supplies and pulling out a t-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts and telling her that he would want those back as soon as her clothes were dry since, if he kept loaning his clothes to an idiot, he'd have nothing for himself to wear. Naruto, who wasn't in the best of moods at the time, had then wandered off muttering something about someone named Suzume not being this much trouble, and gotten back to cleaning Uchiha Madara's statue, taking more care than the last few teams that had been out here apparently had.

As she yet again dipped a toe into the water, and found it too cold to even consider dipping another body part in, she cried about the unfairness of it all. This wasn't how things were supposed to go. She was supposed to have caught Sasuke's heart, been steadily dating him by now, and been well on her way to becoming Mrs. Uchiha. They'd never really said anything about anything like this back in the Academy when they talked about life as a Kunoichi. Back then, in the Kunoichi classes, it had been more about flower arranging, and being able to pass oneself off as a proper woman from just about any social class for a mission, and how best to sit to catch a man's attention if one needed to. All the other stuff like throwing shuriken and kunai and survival training had been covered in the mixed classes, and even then, they hadn't talked about anything like this.

As she backed away from the water again, she found herself running into something. Something that was warm, alive, and much taller than she was, and therefore couldn't be Sasuke-kun whom she didn't really want to see her while she was in this condition. She shrieked and whirled to face the pervert she'd run into and give him what for, only to have Tetsuo-sensei pick her up and throw her into the water before she could say or do anything to him.

"I don't have all day you know." Tetsuo sensei said when she surfaced, cold, wet, angry, and somewhat in shock. "Technically, I do. But, keeping an eye on both you and Sasuke in order to make sure you don't get yourselves killed is much easier if you're both in the same general area."

"Mom was right!" she yelled, angry at him and hoping to land a verbal blow since she couldn't land a physical one. "You're just a..."

"Finish that sentence and I'll hit you." Tetsuo-sensei who had seated himself on a rock on the riverbank replied as he pulled several kunai out of a scroll which had been in a hidden pocket on the outside of his right pants leg and started examining them. "I have no problem hitting girls, and there are people out there who would do worse if you slandered them like that. I'm a happily married man, and I prefer my women with a few more years on them, more sizable...assets, and the ability to take care of themselves, which are all things you don't have."

She sat there in the middle of the river, shivering as the water rushed past her trying to pull her downstream and sputtering in outrage, too upset to speak coherently. She probably looked really stupid, but at that point, she was too cold to care. The inner part of her that usually thought the things that she wasn't supposed to seemed to be agreeing with her for once, based on the way it was swearing.

"Hurry up and wash up, I'm getting tired of waiting for you to get done." Tetsuo-sensei said from his rock where he was sharpening a kunai.

"Why are you being so mean to me? !" she asked, having found her voice and once again crying at the unfairness of it all since directly confronting her sensei on this like she wanted to would probably turn out to be suicide.

"I had a friend that I went through the Academy with." Tetsuo-sensei replied, looking directly at her. "We both graduated at the tail end of the Third War, and were promptly sent out to fight. My friend was placed on a team with a girl that was just like you, but had the excuse that she'd been rushed through the Academy because it was a time of war to explain at least some of her behavior. Rather than waking her up and showing her what's what, their sensei catered to her, and the rest of the team followed his lead. My friend died saving her during what was supposed to be a routine sabotage mission when the little twit walked right into one of the traps they were setting up. It was a waste though, because the girl he died saving died soon after, never having learned her lesson, and never having appreciated my friend's sacrifice."

"I'm sorry about what happened to your friend," she ground out through chattering teeth still upset with her teacher and slightly disappointed that her sympathy ploy hadn't worked. "But what does that have to do with..."

"You?" Tetsuo-sensei finished for her. "As I said, you're just like how that little twit used to be, and unlike her sensei, I'm not going to let you get anyone on this team killed because of your incompetence, least of all yourself. I don't expect you to become the next Tsunade, but it is my job to turn you into a decent Kunoichi, which is something you are a far cry from being right now. If I have to put you through a great deal of hardship in order to do so, then so be it. Better now, than later when your life could depend on skills and a strength of character that you do not yet have."

This cut through the anger she had been steadily building up against him, and she didn't know what to think or how to feel about this. She had gotten used to thinking that he was being mean either just to be mean or because her mother had pissed him off and he was taking it out on her, and had come to dislike her sensei severely because of it. But to do something like this in order to give her a wake-up call before she made a mistake that got someone, maybe even Sasuke, killed?

"Dunk your head under the water to get rid of some of the dirt and grease in your hair, and come out of there before you catch your death of hypothermia." Tetsuo-sensei called to her just as she was getting lost in thought.

She complied and made her way to the riverbank afterward, not feeling anywhere near as clean or refreshed as she should be. When she reached the bank, Tetsuo-sensei threw her a towel with which to dry off, which she did. As soon as she was dry, she changed into the boxers and t-shirt that Naruto loaned her, shivering all the while because she wasn't much warmer out of the water than in it, as the weather was currently only a few degrees warmer than the water had been. As soon as she was dressed, Tetsuo-sensei handed her a comb and a kunai.

"You've got ten minutes to comb your hair. If you can't comb it in that amount of time, cut it until you can." Tetsuo-sensei said when he found her looking down at the kunai in confusion.

"But..." she started, not wanting to let go of the beautiful hair which she'd grown out for Sasuke, in hopes of catching his attention so she could become his wife. Sasuke was so tortured by his past, and he needed a good woman in his life to help him, and she was determined that that woman would be her.

"What do you think would have happened if someone grabbed Uchiha Madara's hair in the middle of a battle?" Tetsuo-sensei asked, drawing her attention to the statues that were off in the distance which her team was supposed to be cleaning.

"Uhh..." she said, wondering what this had to do with her hair.

"The idiot who grabbed Madara's hair would've gotten stabbed in the throat is what would have happened." Tetsuo-sensei said, answering his own question.

Without warning, she felt a hand grip her hair and yank her head back as a kunai was pressed against her throat.

"This is what would happen if your hair were grabbed in the middle of battle however." Tetsuo-sensei whispered in her ear as he pressed the edge of the kunai against her throat more firmly before releasing her and pushing her away from him.

"Long hair on a ninja isn't a mark of beauty. It's a way of saying "I'm better than you, and I can prove it". Time spent tending to that hair is time that could otherwise be spent doing more productive things such as training. Those who have long hair had best be able to back up their claim. " Tetsuo-sensei said when he released her.

Sakura picked up the comb and frantically struggled to comb her hair in the time limit her sensei had given her, determined to not lose the hair she spent so long growing out until it was perfect. The comb ended up getting tangled in it several times. She knew when the time lime limit was up, because her sensei grabbed the comb from her hand and handed her a kunai. When she refused to do as she had been ordered, mainly because she was crying too hard, her sensei lost patience with her and did the job himself, grabbing her hair into a bunch at the nape of her neck and sawing it off.

"We'll even it out later." Tetsuo-sensei said. "Now hurry up and wash your clothes."

Sobbing at the unfairness of it all once more, despite the fact that she wouldn't be receiving any sympathy over this, she hurried to comply as the long hair she'd spent years growing started blowing away in the breeze behind her, lost to her sensei's impatience with her lack of skill.

* * *

While Sakura washed her clothes on the riverbank at the Valley of the End, her father sought an audience with a man he would have been happy to have never seen again in his entire life. It was necessary however. He'd spent the last several days trying to find a job to replace the one he'd lost, and it was beginning to look like he wouldn't find anything legal in Konoha. The reason given for him not being hired was because he'd fallen out of favor with the ninjas. It was more likely that his family had fallen out of favor with only one very powerful ninja in particular, and the other ninjas had fallen into line rather than fall out of favor with him as well, than that he'd fallen out of favor with every ninja in the village, but it all worked out the same in the end.

The only things he could think to do to rectify this situation before he was forced to leave the place that had been his family's home since the Founding was to order his wife to shut up for once in her life before she dug the hole they were in any deeper, attempt to apologize to the man his wife had offended, and throw himself on his mercy. He hoped and prayed that this would work, because if it didn't, his daughter could come back to find them gone.

If they left, who knew when they would see their child again. Sakura had signed up for a minimum of five years of service when she had graduated the Academy, and unless she was dishonorably discharged, or let go for medical reasons, she belonged to Konoha until those five years were up. Because of this, they wouldn't be able to take her with them if they went anywhere, and if they were forced to leave Konoha because of his wife's actions, it could be at least five years before he saw his daughter again, if ever.

This was something that his wife who was protesting against his request that she keep silent about the Shimura family didn't seem to understand however. She'd been getting her way for too long, and because of that she seemed to think that she would be able to bully Shimura Danzo and the other village leaders in this regard. The fact that she'd chased one foreign born family out of the village because the wife had upset her hadn't helped matters because, she had grown so convinced of her power that she currently wasn't able to see the clear signs that she was losing this battle, and losing very badly at that. Since she was currently in what he and Sakura called her Extreme Mode, all she could see was her goal and how she thought she should get to it, no matter who she trampled or what she may have ruined along the way.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	13. A Timely Conversation

Naruto sighed when he noticed that Sakura was still sobbing when she returned the clothes she'd borrowed from him while she washed her own clothes and the outfit he'd lent her. When he'd come upon her while she was washing her clothes, she had been sobbing inconsolably as she scrubbed her dress on the rocks of the riverbank. Tetsuo-sensei had been a bit too harsh with her it seemed and, unlike himself, Sakura had always been overly sensitive about criticism, and couldn't just shrug such things off and keep going. It looked like he would have to be the one to talk to her in order to explain what was going on since Tetsuo-sensei wouldn't and Sasuke and Kakashi probably didn't know.

Things hadn't always been easy with Tetsuo-sensei and, in the beginning, they hadn't had the relationship they had now. Tetsuo-sensei could be rather harsh, especially if you didn't meet his expectations. Considering the fact that he had been one hell of a mess when he'd gotten out of the Academy...Not meeting the man's expectations was putting it mildly.

There had been a time when he'd thought that Tetsuo-sensei had hated him since, rather than teaching him cool things like he did with Suzume and Satoshi, the man had had him running up and down trees and stuff non-stop for days on end, and would only pay attention to him long enough to point out that he was doing something wrong, or would bark harshly at him if he didn't think he was working hard enough on the Chakra control exercises he'd set him to doing. The man had proven that assumption wrong though the day he had gone out and got Kakashi to give him some special training, and had proven that he actually cared for him even further when he had shown actual concern for him when he'd rather stupidly created far more Kage Bunshin than was safe.

Training became a great deal more fun when Tetsuo-sensei realized that he was taking things seriously, and that he was honestly trying, rather than being that bratty kid who did just about anything and everything for attention. When his sensei saw that he was willing to do what it took to succeed as a ninja, rather than not taking things seriously and constantly demanding to be taught a bunch of Super-Awesome Jutsu, he had eased up on him considerably. That didn't mean that Tetsuo-sensei didn't come down on him like a ton of bricks when he goofed off after the man had eased up on him however.

It had been because of Tetsuo-sensei's often harsh training and occasionally biting criticism that he had brought his teammates and Kurosaki back alive after that disaster during the Chunin Exams, and for that, he was grateful.

Rather than letting Sakura wander off alone and curl up in a corner somewhere and continue to let her resentment fester like she looked like she was about to do, he headed after her to have a bit of a talk with her. The girl clearly needed it because, she didn't seem to understand what Tetsuo-sensei was trying to do for her and thought that the man was just picking on her because he didn't like her for some reason. Sure, sensei had been mean about it, and could have gone about it differently but, the consequences of being thrown into battle when you weren't ready were far far worse than anything sensei would say or do during training.

"Hey Sakura-san." he said when he'd reached a good spot to stop her and have a private chat with her.

"What!" the girl snapped, obviously looking like she'd reached the point where she was willing to risk a broken arm just to chase him off.

"I just wanted to talk with you a bit." he said, signing that he didn't mean her any harm.

Actually what he'd signed was "Chill out dude, I'm not gonna hurt you, so put the weapon down" but, it was close enough to his intentions that it worked as far as he was concerned. He'd gotten a couple of chuckles from his teammates over that little substitution when he'd first used it while breaking up an argument between Suzume and Satoshi that looked like it had been about to turn deadly, and had decided to continue using it since it seemed to break the tension quite nicely. It didn't break the tension with Sakura however, as the girl didn't seem to understand what he was saying.

"Well, I don't want to talk to you!" Sakura yelled as she continued to storm away from where the team was camped. "Today has to be the worst day of my life. Actually, the day I got put on this team was the worst day of my life, and this whole week just hammered the point in. I don't even know what I'm doing here, and if I hadn't signed a five year service agreement, I would've already turned around and gone home! If this is what it's like to be a ninja, I might just do that anyways!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! You do not want to open that can of worms." he said, shocked that the girl had even thought about saying something like that, much less actually doing it.

If Sakura turned around and went home right now, she could expect a black mark on her record that would bar her from ever being promoted beyond Genin at best, and being killed for abandoning her mission and betraying Konoha at worst. What would most likely happen to her though would be that she would be dishonorably discharged, which was practically a death-sentence in Konoha. In Konoha, Ninja who were dishonorably discharged were worse than looked down upon, and compared to how dishonorably discharged ninja were treated in the village until they either left of killed themselves to regain what little honor they could for their families, the way the villagers had treated him was downright neighborly.

Sakura ignored his warning however, and stormed off in a different direction. He turned and followed her, hoping and praying that the girl wasn't about to make a mistake that would destroy the rest of her life. He didn't want to see the girl he'd once had a very massive crush on suffer the fate of a ninja who had turned their back on a mission. Since she was a comrade, he still cared about her, even though he no-longer liked her all that much as a person.

"If you do run off, you'd better be prepared to run as far away from Konoha as fast as you can before dying that distinctive hair of yours, changing your identity, and looking over your shoulder for Hunter-nins for every second of every day for the rest of your undoubtedly short life. Because, running back to Konoha without authorization right now would only get you into some seriously deep shit." he said as he ran alongside the pink haired girl, easily keeping up with her.

That statement caused her to pause in shock.

"The way I see it right now, you've got two choices. You can put up with the situation as it is for the next two months, and prove to Tetsuo-sensei that you are a ninja not a weakling, which will greatly increase your standing in both his eyes and the eyes of the village. Or, you can run, and either be hunted for the rest of your life, or be dishonorably discharged depending on which direction you run in, either way bringing shame upon yourself and your family that neither of you will ever be able to live down." he said, laying all the cards out on the table for the girl who obviously hadn't been ready to be a ninja, much as he hadn't been when he started out and signed a contract that was similar to Sakura's because, he'd thought that he was beyond ready and didn't need a trial period.

His statement gave the girl pause, and she stopped running, which was good in his book. If she had continued to run despite the fact that he'd told her what would happen to her if she did so, he would have been forced to knock her out, drag her back to camp, and leave her for Tetsuo-sensei to deal with.

"Why?" Sakura asked, making him wonder if she was asking why in general, or asking a specific question.

"Why what?" he asked, hoping for further clarification so he could give her an answer if it were at all possible.

"Why is this happening to me?" Sakura asked, fresh tears streaming from her eyes.

"Several reasons, some of them aren't your fault, and some of them are." he replied, getting a little closer to the subject that he'd originally wanted to speak with Sakura about before she nearly went missing-nin. "When Tetsuo-sensei heard that he was getting the Top Kunoichi and the Rookie of the year to fill the gaps left by Suzume and Satoshi's promotions, he had figured that he'd only need to work with us only a little bit in order to prepare us for the Chunin Exams in January, and had signed us up for a bunch of missions in advance so you and Sasuke could have the eight missions that are the required minimum in order to be considered for promotion. Missions which we cannot back out of now that we've accepted them."

Sakura looked like she could understand that at least, and that she would continue to listen to him rather than run again. She'd even stopped crying, which was even better.

"Thanks to the fact that there was a traitor in the Academy who was glossing over things in your and Sasuke's reports so the other Instructors didn't know that there were subjects that they needed to work with you on, and sabotaging your educations in a million other little ways that the other Instructors didn't catch on to, you weren't anything approaching what Tetsuo-sensei expected you to be." he continued, knowing that the girl needed to hear this.

"When it became clear to him that you were not yet ready for life as a ninja, he went into his harsh teacher mode and set out to either toughen you up or break you early before you became a danger to others." he said, getting to the point he'd wanted to make earlier.

"But that's so unfair!" Sakura yelled in indignation.

"I've lived through it, and so can you." he replied as kindly as he could. "When you show him that you're actually taking things seriously, that you're determined to become a better ninja, and that you aren't just going to fall back into old habits the instant he turns around, he'll ease up and become alot nicer. Training's a great deal more fun when he does."

"Really?" Sakura asked in a disbelieving tone.

"Yeah really." he replied, knowing from experience. "If it weren't for Tetsuo-sensei being harsh on me until I stopped being a stupid little kid, and started being a proper Ninja of the Leaf, my team wouldn't have come back from the Chunin Exams."

Sakura seemed to consider this, and that was probably the best he was going to get out of her right now. He'd be happy if she took his advice but, he would settle for her not running off and destroying her life.

"Come on, let's go back." he said offering her his hand. "I've got a pair of scissors in my bag which might help with the hair."

Sakura took his hand, which was hopefully the first step.

* * *

While Naruto and Sakura made their way back to camp and the hope of a better haircut for Sakura, Sasuke sat in the bushes where he'd overheard Naruto and Sakura's conversation after he'd witnessed Sakura's little meltdown after he'd followed the pair of them, curious about what the Uzumaki was up to. The only thing that was running through is mind now however was the rather shocking bit of information that the Uzumaki had let slip. Information that, now that he'd thought about it, the Uzumaki had let slip before. Information which he'd ignored because he'd been far more focused on the Uzumaki at the time than he had been on what the other boy had been saying.

Now, he was focused on the information that the Uzumaki had given, information that personally affected him.

There had been a traitor in the Academy. There had been a traitor in the Academy who had sabotaged the students' educations. There had been a traitor in the Academy who had sabotaged the students' educations, his included.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	14. History or the Lack Thereof

"Is there something you needed Sasuke?" Tetsuo asked when he got tired of the feeling of being stared at, which was something that was rather uncomfortable for an experienced ninja because it kept triggering their danger sense.

The boy had been sitting there staring at him for more than an hour, obviously wanting to ask him something, but either unwilling or unable to bring himself to ask. He had naturally felt a great deal of unease and discomfort for that entire hour, unease and discomfort that was now bordering on torture. Since he wanted it to stop, it had been up to him to ask what the boy wanted, despite the fact that he was loathe to do so since it would give the boy the upper hand in this situation, which was something the boy didn't deserve.

"Yes." the Uchiha boy replied almost imperiously. "I need a full evaluation of my skills."

"I already evaluated you." he said, remembering that slightly disappointing evening a few nights earlier when he and Kakashi had evaluated the Uchiha's Taijutsu, and Ninjutsu skills in order to see exactly what they'd need to work with him on.

While the boy's speed and reflexes were good and, aside from a few flaws, his Taijutsu was Low to Mid Chunin, and his Ninjutsu repertoire was somewhat impressive for a boy his age, the Uchiha child's mental state disturbed the both of them. If Hatake Kakashi, who most definitely wasn't the poster-boy for mental stability, was worried about the boy's mental state, he knew that he should be beyond worried. Right now, the boy didn't have the right attitude to become a Chunin, and if a promotion got pushed through anytime in the near future, he would be concerned for any team the boy got placed on.

He would have been willing to say that the boy was dangerously overconfident in his skills and his individual prowess but, that wasn't quite it. From what he'd seen during their evaluation spar and afterward, especially during the incident with the statue earlier, it was clear that the boy had known when he'd bitten off more than he could chew. Instead of retreating so he could come at the problem from a different angle later, the Uchiha had still pushed through, not caring about the potential cost to himself. That was something that could very easily get the boy killed either during training or in the field one day if it wasn't corrected.

"You only did an evaluation of my Taijutsu and Ninjutsu ability." Sasuke said. "I want a full evaluation of all of my skills."

"All of them?" he asked incredulously, wondering what was up with the boy now.

He didn't need any more problems coming from that quarter, especially when he had his hands full with the Haruno girl who was a headache and a half all on her own.

"Why would you want something like that?" he asked "And, why would you even expect me to be able to do something like that right here and right now? Does it look like I've got the Academy guidelines and all of the textbooks on hand?"

When it became clear to him that he wouldn't immediately cater to the unreasonable demand, the Uchiha boy stood there and scowled at him. Considering the fact that something approaching a scowl was the child's default mode, it was possible that the boy was only mildly annoyed by the fact that he was questioning his demands rather than immediately giving in to them. Then again, mildly annoyed could actually be the boy's default mode, and he'd just pissed the kid off because he'd decided not to cater to the whims of the poor orphaned Last of the Uchiha whom just about everybody seemed to suck up to despite the fact that up until about four years ago, just about everybody - him included - thought that it had been one of the boy's relatives, quite possibly the boy's father, that had set the Kyuubi loose on Konoha.

Out of a desire not to speak ill of the dead, he didn't bring up his suspicions regarding the Uchiha after the Massacre but, there was not speaking ill of the dead, and there was this whatever it was that a majority of the villagers had decided to do after the Uchiha had been slaughtered, which seemed to have been to wipe clean from their minds all of the sins the Uchiha had committed back when the arrogant bastards who had run around the village like they'd owned it were still alive. It was strange really, there were people who had absolutely despised the Uchiha when the clan was still alive who had never said a single harsh word to Sasuke after the Massacre, and offered the boy everything short of the moon. He would have expected them to have been more wary of the boy, especially considering the fact that it had been the boy's brother who had slaughtered the clan, parents included, but that had turned out not to be the case.

"There was a traitor in the Academy, and I want to make sure my education hasn't suffered as a result." Sasuke finally said, pulling him out of his musings on the bizarre treatment of the boy and the memory of the Uchiha Clan after the massacre.

"I'll see what I can do on such short notice." he replied, after a bit of thought on the subject, as the boy's demand didn't seem as unreasonable as it normally would have been in that light.

It wasn't as if he really had anything else to do with his evening since he was out here, and cobbling together a rough approximation of the Academy Curriculum from faded memories from over a decade ago was as good a way as any to kill time. Normally around now, he'd be putting his daughter to bed but, since he wasn't at home, and wasn't going to be home for a long while, that wasn't an option. About the only reason he had been able to take two months to go camping with his team though had been because he and his wife had hit a little rough patch in their relationship, and his wife needed a little space at the moment. Their arguments had been getting a bit worse lately, and if a little time apart was what it took to repair their relationship, he would gladly give his wife all the time she needed. As they say, distance makes the heart grow fonder, and by the time he returned, she should be very happy to see him again. Either that, or she'd be waiting by the door with the divorce papers when he returned.

The thought of what the traitor who'd wormed his way into the Academy could have done to the Uchiha aside from glossing over several potentially serious mental problems, disturbed him as well. Something like this could seriously affect the team, and thereby affect him, now that he really stopped to think about it rather than grumble about the low quality of this year's batch of students as he tried to repair all of the visible problems with his new students. It was entirely possible that the boy had missed some sort of vital lesson and didn't even know it, which meant that he wouldn't know that the boy didn't know since the boy couldn't alert him, and he might not ask the question that would reveal the boy's ignorance on the subject for a good long time, by which it would have been too late. The same went for Sakura, whom he would have to evaluate as well, considering the fact that the two of them had been in the same class, and neither fit the profiles that had hailed them both as extremely gifted and ready to be out in the field which had been in their files.

He really should have done this in the beginning before they left and, because he hadn't, he was going to be paying for it now as he scrounged around for some way to evaluate the Uchiha boy's and Haruno girl's skills outside of Taijutsu, Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, and weapons handling.

Rather than thanking him for even considering doing him a favor such as the one he'd asked for, after he had given the boy a positive answer, the Uchiha boy had turned away and moved towards the fire, as if he'd fully expected the favor to have been given to him, and didn't care how much it would inconvenience the person who was giving him said favor. The fact that the boy was no longer staring or scowling at him was the only good thing that had come out of that entire exchange. He'd say that he didn't know where that boy had learned his manners but, that'd be lying since he'd run into a number of officers in the KMPF who had had the same attitude as the one the boy was displaying right now.

For some reason, as Sasuke moved back towards the fire, Naruto had started scrounging through his pack. Ever since Suzume had taught the boy how to do storage seals, Naruto had packed the same way for each mission, placing a layer of easily accessible supplies over a thicker layer of storage scrolls which contained any spare supplies he may own and might need during the mission, often changing out the supplies on the top layer with supplies that had previously been in the scrolls. For this trip however, there was an even thicker layer of storage scrolls in the boy's bag than usual which caused Naruto's search for a particular scroll to take longer than normal, and had resulted in the boy grumbling as he tipped out the contents of his bag and rooting through them. After Naruto found what he was looking for amongst his storage scrolls, he walked over and handed him the scroll in question over to him.

"What's this?" he asked.

"I got my hands on a black market set of the Academy textbooks a while back when I decided to see if there was something I was missing by not being in the Academy." Naruto replied, shrugging. "I checked them against the copies at the Academy and found them to be entirely accurate."

"Why are you carrying these with you?" he asked, though he knew that he would probably regret do so, since the answer would probably give him a headache.

The boy often did the strangest things for the strangest reasons. Because he also possessed the devil's own luck however, most of the bizarre crap the boy did ended up working out in his favor in the most unexpected ways, especially after he had handed down the skills he'd learned on his mother's knee to his students. Of the three, Satoshi may have been the best con-artist but, Naruto had been the one who had gotten the strangest cons to work. He still couldn't figure out how the boy had managed to con a ninja out of three thousand ryo with a piece of string and a chalkboard eraser last year.

"I asked Satoshi to watch my plants while I was away." Naruto explained.

That explained everything perfectly, especially since Satoshi's kleptomaniac tendencies had gotten worse lately. Satoshi had always been something of a sneak thief like most of the rest of his family, but paired with the teen's gambling addiction, it was a recipe for disaster. Especially since the boy hadn't learned his lesson during the team's first C-Rank, and seemed to have picked up the idea that he'd be able to con his way out of anything the way the team had conned their way out of that situation.

"So, you packed your entire apartment?" he asked.

"Yup." Naruto replied. "Everything but the trash."

Sighing at his students' antics, he pulled the textbooks out of the scroll with the intention of flipping through them and comparing them to what he remembered of the Academy curriculum. As he flipped through the edition of the Academy's History text which was only about two years old, he found himself frowning.

"Odd." he said, as he turned back to the entry on the Shodai Hokage to check something. "It could be because it's gone, and they've all but died out, but there's not a single mention of Uzushiogakure or even the Uzumaki Clan anywhere. Senju Hashirama's wife isn't even mentioned in this."

"What?!" Kakashi said as he snatched the book out of his hands and started furiously flipping through it himself.

"Excuse me," the Haruno girl piped up from her side of the fire. "But, why would the Uzumaki be listed in a Konoha textbook? They're from Iwa, aren't they?"

"WHAT?!" he, Naruto, and Kakashi all yelled at the same time.

"Who the hell told you that?!" Kakashi asked, sounding unusually upset, as if he'd taken that question personally for some reason.

"My mother." Sakura replied, sounding slightly sheepish.

"For your information." Naruto, who had eagerly studied the subject of his clan and their former village after he'd come across a reference to the name Uzumaki in a book on traps which had several traps which integrated seals into them, said in an offended tone. "The Uzumaki were allies of the Senju, with whom they frequently intermarried, who had settled in the Land of Whirlpools and founded Uzushiogakure, which was Konoha's closest ally for generations until its destruction near the end of the Second War."

Both Sakura and Sasuke appeared surprised to hear this. They shouldn't have been. He had been tested on basic information about Uzushiogakure and several notable members of the Uzumaki Clan who had aided Konoha in times of trouble back during his history classes at the Academy. So, they should've been as well, considering the fact that they had been an integral part of Konoha's history, and just about every Konoha ninja above the rank of Genin wore the symbol of Uzushiogakure on their uniforms, himself and Kakashi included.

* * *

While Tetsuo and Kakashi were checking the history book to see what else was missing, an Instructor from Iwa's Ninja Academy, which ran on a slightly different cycle from Konoha's, was running a nighttime survival exercise with his students.

"Best money I ever spent." the Instructor muttered as he reeled his chalkboard eraser back in after using it to catch the attention of a particularly inattentive student who was now rubbing a small lump on his head.

Previously, he'd used kunai to catch the brats' attention when it wandered but, he'd been suspended and sent out into the field on a bunch of crappy C Ranked missions after there had been an...accident with one of the students. Ever since he'd returned, he had used the method that several of the Konoha Ninja Academy's Instructors swore by. Normally, he would be reluctant to use a Leaf Ninja method out of principle but, this one had proven to be effective time and again, and with it, there was no risk of suspension for injuring his students if his aim was slightly off.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	15. The Results of Assessment

Sandaime Hokage Sarutobi Hiruzen sighed as he signed the last bit of paperwork that was on his desk. Now that that was taken care of, he could go home and probably spend some time with his grandson who wasn't as much a brat as he used to be. Without the annoyance of constant attacks from that area thanks to Naruto, spending time with Konohamaru had become a great deal more enjoyable, especially after the boy had started taking his studies more seriously, and had come to him asking him for advice.

As he was gathering his hat and outer robe from the back of his chair, one of the administrative Chunin walked in with a note which, based on the fact that it looked as if it had been rolled up for some time, had apparently just come off a bird and passed through all of the necessary security checks. Sighing, he set his hat back down and took the undoubtedly important note from the secretary, knowing that his work for the day wasn't quite as done as he hoped. Upon opening the missive, he found that it was from Danzo's hated grandson who he had allowed to take his students on a two month training trip in hopes of preparing them for the upcoming Chunin Exams.

The reason he had allowed the trip to take place in the first place had been because the two students he'd given the man from that year's graduating class had been the best the Academy had to offer this year, and he himself was curious as to whether or not the man could pull it off. If the man could pull it off, Konoha's standing would only improve, as the Uchiha boy and the Haruno girl, who hopefully didn't take too much after her mother, would become the poster children of the new generation. The fact that the Haruno girl was civilian born would hopefully inspire a number of civilian children who were sitting on the fence regarding becoming ninjas into signing up for the Academy.

Pulling himself out of his musings over the Shimura boy's daring experiment, he turned to the letter he'd just received from the man.

_Hokage-sama,_

_I have done as complete an evaluation of the skills of Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura as I can with the materials I had available to me at the time. Fortunately, some of those materials were a set of the Academy texts that Naruto happened to have on him that I was able to use to gauge his teammates' academic skills._

_When It comes to Uchiha Sasuke:_

_His academic skills are above average, but nothing to write home about. His Taijutsu skills are rather excellent for a boy his age, as are his skills in Ninjutsu and Weapons Handling. His Trap Setting and Strategy skills are slightly deficient however, and when it comes to Genjutsu, it was almost as if he'd never even bothered to study it._

_When it comes to Haruno Sakura:_

_She is roughly at genius level in areas that are more academic, and has a near eidedic memory. She is not quite at the level of the average Nara, but a genius nonetheless. Unfortunately, her Taijutsu skills are well below average, and her form is perfect Textbook with little to no innovation. When it comes to her Ninjutsu skills, she is proficient at the standard Academy Three, but knows little else. Her Weapons Handling skills are average, aside from the exceedingly long time it takes her to aim. Her trap setting skills are somewhat deficient, but her Strategy skills are slightly above average. When it comes to Genjutsu, her lack of knowledge in that area is amazing considering her perfect Chakra control. which makes her well suited for either that field or Ijutsu._

_Mentally and personality-wise, both Sasuke and Sakura are somewhat worrying. I will admit here and now that neither of them would have passed the final test had I taken the time to administer it, and for different reasons. Sasuke is exceedingly anti-social, and does not take well to teamwork, and Sakura, who follows Sasuke's lead in just about everything, was completely unprepared for life as a ninja when she graduated._

_Considering the consistencies in the academic areas in which both students are deficient, I have come to believe that there were factors beyond interference from the traitorous Assistant Instructor Mizuki involved. An examination of the textbooks that Naruto has provided seems to confirm this fear._

_While it is possible that some items I recall learning during my days in the Academy are missing due to the fact that the textbooks Naruto provided me with are black market copies rather than originals from the Academy stores, it is unlikely, as Naruto asserts that he checked them against the copies that are held at the Academy, and that they are entirely accurate. Most of the books appear to be okay for the most part but, the History text and the Traps text appear to be slightly deficient. The History text is missing all mention of Uzushiogakure and the Uzumaki as well as several important historical events that I recalled studying in my youth. Other entries in the book appear to be different from what I remember learning as well. When it comes to the Trap text, Kakashi insists that a number of diagrams are missing, including what he insists is the standard "Shock Tag Surprise", which is somewhat confusing, as I don't recall studying that one in the Academy._

_While prospects of my new students being prepared for the upcoming Chunin Exams look bleak, I am holding out hope for improvement._

_Shimura Tetsuo._

_P.S. Naruto asked me to tell you and Konohamaru that he says Hi._

The Hokage groaned as he reached the end of the letter. This was beyond problematic, and the fault in this case may have partially been his. Every time he had been asked to review the new editions of the Academy textbooks, it had been when he was at his busiest, and he'd usually done nothing more than flip through them and check that the pictures, charts, and diagrams were in their proper places and looked reasonably correct before signing off on them. He'd gotten rather sick of reading the Academy texts long before he had named Minato his successor, and with other, more important work piling up and waiting for him to finish with the Academy texts...

Based on what he'd read in the Shimura boy's letter, that had apparently been a major mistake on his part.

He knew exactly why the diagram for the Shock Tag Surprise wasn't in the Academy text though. Around the start of the Third War, when the texts were being pared down in order to graduate students faster and get them out in the field sooner, the Shock Tag Surprise diagram had been removed for the safety of the students. Before then, there had been a number of accidents when immature children had attempted to set up that particular trap because it been both impressive and easy to create, accidents that Konoha couldn't afford to have in a time of war when every able bodied ninja was needed to fight. It simply hadn't been put back in the text afterward.

Growling at the unfairness of it all, since it looked like he wouldn't be getting the early evening that he'd been anticipating all afternoon when he'd noticed how little paperwork there was on his desk, he re-lit his pipe and called in one of his secretaries.

"Bring me all of the current Academy textbooks for each year, and the Academy Teaching Guidelines." he ordered.

After looking somewhat shocked for a moment, the man turned and raced out the door, hastening to comply.

Tonight was going to be a looooooong night.

* * *

Sasuke was exhausted after the evaluation of his skills which had been even more thorough than his Academy Graduation Exam had been was finished but, relieved to learn that his education hadn't suffered too badly under the teachings of the traitor who had wormed his way into the Academy. His new sensei had even said that with a little fine tuning, all of his skills would shortly be at Chunin level, and that he could rise even higher beyond that if he worked at it. He'd also said something about his attitude that he didn't bother listening to because, he didn't see anything wrong with his attitude. If his teacher didn't like the fact that he wasn't sucking up to him or his teammates, that was tough.

Besides, if he didn't have any close friends, he wouldn't be tempted to use them to...

"Well at least now I know I won't be a failure like Obito." Sasuke muttered as he headed back to the fire where the rest of the group was assembled.

That had been one of his worries over the years since he'd learned who the Obito person his aunts and uncles and cousins had compared him to behind his back was. Obito had been a bad enough failure that his name hadn't even been placed on the list of Uchiha who had died in battle, despite the fact that he had done so. Obito had been so horrible, that the clan had pretty much cast him out after he died, and only acknowledged his prior existence in hushed whispers, and a very short listing of statistics in the clan archives. As far as he knew, nobody had been as bad a failure as Obito who'd done something so unspeakable that the clan dared not mention it in his presence.

An instant after those words had left his mouth, he found himself being slammed into a tree by a murderously angry Hatake Kakashi. A murderously angry Hatake Kakashi who glared at him as if he'd just spat on the Memorial Stone or gone grave robbing in the Konoha Cemetary in broad daylight or something.

"If you ever say anything like that about Obito again..." Kakashi snarled threateningly before slamming his head into the tree once more and dropping him like a piece of discarded trash and walking off.

"Did you even bother studying recent history Sasuke?" the Uzumaki, who had come over to check and see if he was alright, only for him to push him away because he didn't need to be coddled, least of all by him, asked.

"Why?" he asked, as he picked himself up off the ground, still slightly stunned by Kakashi's rather bizarre behavior.

He'd been told that the Academy History texts were missing a few important events, but he didn't think that someone the clan regarded as an absolute failure as a Uchiha and as a person in general would be involved in any of them. If he had been, he would have figured that he would have been on the wrong side, considering the tone of some of the hushed whispers he'd caught about the boy.

"Uchiha Obito was Kakashi's teammate under the Yondaime, and was killed in action when he'd saved Kakashi's life in battle. Far from being a failure, he'd already been a Chunin for over a year by the time he reached the age you are now." Naruto replied casually.

He repressed a snarl. He'd already known that crap about Obito being a Chunin but, since it was a wartime promotion, that meant that it didn't count as much since it was rushed through. He'd heard the stories about how, during a war, kids were shoved out of the Academy door before they were ready and given promotions they hadn't earned, only to have to be given remedial training the instant the war was over. He didn't need some outsider comparing him to someone the clan had regarded as a monumental failure, and finding him wanting.

If he was to be compared to anyone, he should be compared to his father. His father had been a great man, and hadn't deserved to have been killed by That Man, that traitor who had smiled and told him he loved him while all the while scheming to kill their entire family behind his back, leaving him behind because he was too weak and worthless to kill.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	16. The Dreaded Textbooks

The first thing that the Hokage thought when the first stack of textbooks was set down on his desk was: _These are the pared down wartime versions. Where are the long versions?_

Immediately after he'd thought this, he found himself trying to recall exactly what the Academy texts he'd been approving for the last decade or so had looked like, and about how long they had been. Considering how much of his tenure had been served in times of war, it wouldn't be all that surprising for him to have found the wartime versions of the Academy texts normal in appearance if they were sitting on his desk along with a great deal of paperwork that was clamoring for his attention. Paperwork that he had mistakenly seen as more important because it had seemed so at the time because it had been in more urgent need of attention due to its time sensitivity.

He had approved the use of the wartime version of the Academy texts for the first couple of years after the Kyuubi attack in order to bring numbers back up. That, and because, with fewer pages and less pictures, they were much cheaper to print, which had been a plus in the poor economy which had taken double hits with the post-war rebuilding and the Kyuubi attack that had followed so soon after. Come to think of it though, when had he discontinued their use? Surely, he must've done so when numbers had started approaching pre-war levels, right?

Sighing, he pulled the First Year History text towards him and started reading it first since it would be the quickest and easiest to blow through since it had been written for six and seven year-olds and was mostly pictures. Soon, he found himself grabbing a red marker and angrily correcting several passages. There was adjusting accounts of historical events to put Konoha in a favorable light, and there was this. Even events he had been present for and seen firsthand had been twisted into near unrecognizability in order to put Konoha in an unbelievably positive light.

With unbelievable crap like this in the History books, students would be disinclined to believe any other history they learned over their lifetimes. Their minds would fall back on how patently false the history they had been taught in the Academy was when anyone tried to present them with a new historical fact, and disbelieve it out of principle. This was of course very, very, bad. Ninja needed to learn from history in order to not make the mistakes of the past. And, how could they do that with the only history they learned being the "Konoha is always right" version?

About the only thing that was reasonably accurate in the book and the subsequent history books for the later years that he'd flipped through were the pictures, and several of those had been altered as well. He could understand the alteration that was made to the photo of his sensei and the Shodai Hokage's daughter considering the fact that the girl had shown clear signs of having been born to a Jinchuriki, signs that Naruto also bore. He could also understand the alteration to the close-up photo of the Yondaime that had turned Minato's eyes green, considering the fact that Naruto had still been at the Academy when the editions in front of him had come into use. But, some of the alterations he'd seen frankly didn't make any sense, such as the fact that everything but Senju Hashirama and Uchiha Madara's hands were cut out of the iconic image of the Founding of Konoha.

This was already far worse than he thought it was going to be, and he wasn't even finished with the history books yet. No wonder the crop of graduates over the last several years had been so disappointing.

He'd been wondering why the average failure rate for the final graduation exam had shot up from 50% to somewhere in the range of 66 to 75%, and why there were fewer and fewer Jounin candidates with each passing year, and now he knew. He'd been rubberstamping this crap that was sitting in front of him for years, and as a result, he got crap for ninja. Danzo was right, he had been seriously slipping, and it was long past time he handed the reins over.

Sighing, he called for his undoubtedly overworked secretary who should have gone home already but, had been sent running to the Academy for books and lesson outlines and just about everything else that pertained to the Academy he could get his hands on.

"Schedule a meeting with all of the Academy Instructors in the morning, and I mean all of them." he told the man when he made his way in with yet another pile of books. "Tell them to cancel classes for the Spring Cycle students if they have to in order to make it in."

While he couldn't do what he wanted and call in every ninja who had graduated from the Academy since the Third War for an assessment as that would start an unnecessary panic that could lower Konoha's standing in the international scene and drive away valuable customers, he could call back every student who may have even had contact with Mizuki, assess them, and give them remedial training if necessary. Even the students who had previously failed would be amongst this number, as their failure may not have entirely been their fault.

The one good thing about Mizuki's betrayal of Konoha was that it had called attention to this shitstorm before it became a shit hurricane, and provided a good excuse to correct the education of some of the more recent years' graduating classes before the village completely went down the tubes.

Scowling at the rather stupid picture of a cartoon animal that was supposed to teach small children about weapon safety rather than the gruesome picture of the brat who had mishandled a kunai which had taught him the same thing in his youth, he got up, stretched, and headed home. Not to sleep, but to get his hands on his children's Academy textbooks which he'd saved and stored away in a closet. After he got his hands on those, he might go down to Supply to see if they had a stock of old Academy textbooks in a dusty corner somewhere. They should, since he'd once wandered through one of their older storage facilities once and found a crate that contained several spare sets of the sort of armor that he used to wear back in the day before the vests that his sensei had designed before he died became all the rage.

When he reached the door, he found Danzo on the other side blocking the exit.

"Ah, I was hoping to catch you before you left." Danzo said, giving him that smile that could mean anything from "Hello old friend" to "Why don't you die and give me the hat already, you bastard?" depending on what mood the man was actually in.

"Can you be brief?" he asked, not really in the mood to deal with his old friend. "I'm going to be very busy for the foreseeable future, and I was hoping to get a few hours of sleep in before I met with the Academy Instructors in the morning."

"Is there any particular reason why?" Danzo asked, eying the massive piles of textbooks that were on his desk as well as another massive pile of Academy Instructor guidelines.

"I'm revamping the Academy curriculum." he replied as he edged around his friend who had moved out of the way a bit.

"Going to make it more kid friendly are you?" Danzo asked sourly, probably imagining the sort of ninja that would be created if the books were more "kid friendly" than the First Year texts he'd nearly barfed over while reading them already were. The current First Year texts were saccharine enough to give one cavities, and he had absolutely no desire to see how they could be made worse.

"Nope, I'm going to be chucking out all of that crap over there, pulling out the texts from before the last war, and updating them." he replied as he made his way down the hall.

"So, no more of that kittens and butterflies crap you've been promoting for the last decade?" Danzo called after him, sounding almost hopeful.

"Kittens and butterflies?!" he exclaimed, wondering exactly how bad the books he'd never had the inclination to do more than skim through in under five minutes really were. "As soon as I find the bastard who keeps putting the Academy texts on my desk when I've got three feet of paperwork that needed to be seen to yesterday waiting for me, I'm going to strangle him."

* * *

Sakura sighed slightly as she drifted off to sleep, sore and exhausted, but barely paying attention to that because there was something else stuck in her mind as she slipped into unconsciousness.

Today had been an interesting day to say the least. She'd been woken up early in the morning for an assessment of her skills which had taken most of the day as it had been exceedingly thorough, more difficult that the Academy Graduation Exam which had been spaced out over the course of a week had been, and covered things she hadn't even heard of in the Academy. After an afternoon's rest while her and Sasuke's scores were being tabulated and she was once again found wanting, Kakashi had taken her aside to teach her one of the Medical Ninjutsu that he'd picked up over the years. Rather than have her practice on a dummy or something like she'd half expected him to do, he had her practice the Chakra Scalpel technique on a fish.

While she was practicing, working her hardest to get the Jutsu right, Tetsuo-sensei had wandered over to check on her progress. Rather than scowling in disappointment over her lack of skill, the man had actually smiled at her and gave her a small nod.

He, the man who'd previously had nothing but scorn for her, had actually smiled at her!

After days and days of harsh words and even harsher looks as she repeatedly failed to meet his expectations, that smile had been...indescribable. It made her feel that maybe Naruto was right, and that her sensei didn't hate her because she resembled someone who'd inadvertently caused the death of one of his friends, and that if she just worked at it, she could get some more of the smiles that the man had previously only reserved for Naruto. On one level, it hurt that she had to work so hard to earn even one smile from the man, but on another, it gave her hope that things would improve, and that they wouldn't remain as hellish as they currently were.

As she went to sleep, she clung to that hope as hard as she could. It was the only thing that was keeping her from running away right now. If she could just tough it out for a little while longer, things would get better, and her family would be proud of her when she returned home, rather than ashamed.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	17. Changes at the Academy

Umino Iruka found himself fidgeting nervously as he stood outside the Hokage's office, having been summoned to a meeting in his capacity as an Academy Instructor the night before. As he was an Instructor for the Fall Cycle, he should be on break right now. Actually, he should be at the Missions Assignment desk where he spent most of his breaks because he could neither stand nor afford two months and change of near complete inactivity. That, and dealing with ninja who have problems with the missions given for whatever reason, such as too easy, not enough pay, etc, kept his skills for dealing with unruly students somewhat sharp.

He wasn't the only one waiting outside the Hokage's office. A number of other Instructors including Suzume, the Kunoichi Instructor who shared a name with one of Naruto's teammates who'd gone on to become a Chunin, and Daikoku were amongst the group that waiting there as well. In fact, with the arrival of one of the Spring Cycle First Year Instructors, it looked like every Instructor from the Academy was here.

As he began to wonder why the Hokage had called a meeting that had required the presence of every last Academy Instructor, including the Spring Cycle ones who should have been teaching classes right now, the door to the office opened, and they all filed inside. The Hokage was seated at his desk smoking his usual pipe, as he waited for the Instructors to enter. The man looked exhausted, as if he'd stayed up all night the night before and had only paused to change for the meeting.

"For those of you who are wondering whey you're here, I have decided to revamp the Academy Curriculum, effective immediately." the Hokage said as soon as they were arrayed before his desk. "I have called you all here to get your input on the intended curriculum and teaching methods that I plan to implement."

There were several noises of shock at this because there hadn't been such a radical change in the Academy Curriculum in...Ever.

"I will also be recalling all of the Fall Cycle Instructors back to the Academy in order to re-evaluate every student who may have come in contact with former Assistant Instructor Mizuki aside from Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura who have already been evaluated effective immediately." the Hokage continued, silencing the noise that the Instructors were making as they speculated on why the Hokage was changing the Academy Curriculum so suddenly seeing as he hadn't made the decision to do so immediately after Mizuki's perfidy had been discovered. "There will be a number of Jounin on hand to give a second opinion of your assessments, and assist in the retraining of any students that might benefit from such."

"Now that the major announcements are out of the way." The Hokage said as he reached over for one of the old and rather dated looking books that had been piled up on his desk. "These are the basic texts that the Academy will now be using. I have already contacted a publisher to update the information contained within to account for recent historical events and advancements in the field."

Daikoku, who apparently recognized the book that the Hokage was holding looked startled for some reason. In fact, all of the Instructors over the age of thirty seemed rather surprised to see the book that the Hokage was holding. He didn't know why though, other than the fact that it looked a bit thicker than the standard textbook.

"What was wrong with the books we've been using?" Suzume, who taught the Kunoichi classes asked. "They seemed to be rather effective."

"Unfortunately, they weren't." the Hokage replied. "While the more child-friendly tone of the texts you've been using until now tended to put the civilian parents' minds at ease, they did little to nothing to prepare the children for life in the field as they were supposed to. As a result, there has been a marked increase in failures amongst Academy graduates over the last decade or so."

His curiosity about what he was now expected to teach his students who may be in serious need of remedial training drove him to break ranks and move forward to where the texts he was expected to teach from were laid out. He moved towards the Hokage's desk which was piled high with books that looked and smelled as if they had been in storage for a long while. He knew the old man would forgive him for this, breach of protocol, as the old man had forgiven him of several similar breaches before.

"May I?" he asked as he reached for one of the First Year texts which looked as if they dated back to the Nidaime's reign.

"Go ahead." the Hokage said, giving him a small smile.

He opened the book. It was a basic reading primer, which was somewhat to be expected, considering the fact that a couple generations before, literacy wasn't as common as it was now, and not all of the children could be taught to read at home. The next book below that was a basic book on weapons handling which had to be gone through before the young students were handed kunai and shuriken and led out to target practice for the first time. He flipped it open, and blanched when he reached the first picture.

Rather than an admonishment from Flopsy the Ninja Rabbit about safe weapons handling like in the current text, there was a rather gruesome image of a young boy who had accidentally stabbed through his hand with a live kunai. This was far more graphic than the image that had been there during his own Academy days which had been a sketch of a badly injured and unhappy boy rather than an actual photograph of a ninja he thought he recognized.

"Ah, yes, that." the Hokage said mildly when he caught sight of his expression. "Uchiha Fugaku's father was messing around with his father's weapons one day, and injured himself. Someone managed to capture an image of the injury before the child was taken to the hospital, and it was passed around the clan as a warning to any other children who might try something similar. It eventually ended up in other hands, and was included in the Academy textbook because it had served as a rather effective warning."

Effective? Heck, it looked like it would scare half the little First Year kids out of the Academy the instant they saw it. He said as much to the Hokage, who had pinched the bridge of his nose, shook his head, and sighed.

* * *

Haruno Kita bowed in front of Danzo as he made a formal apology on behalf of his family during the brief audience he had secured with the busy man who was going to be in a meeting with the Hokage soon.

"...and I am sorry for any offense my wife may have caused you." he concluded his apology from where he was crouched on the floor.

"I accept your apology." Danzo, who was just as scary as he remembered him being, replied. "This won't really correct your family's misfortune however, as it wasn't just your wife's slandering of me and my family name that upset the village ninja as you seem to have come to believe. News of your wife's unfortunate mishandling of her daughter's care and training has gotten across the village, and as a result, a number of ninja came to question your suitability as parents. If a person cannot be a proper parent, one tends to wonder what other responsibilities that person may fail at..."

He turned pale as he bowed once more and took his leave of the elder. He had left his daughter's training in his wife's hands because he knew little to nothing about being a ninja, and his wife had the time and the eagerness to involve herself in her daughter's training, meet with the girl's Instructors, and meet with the mothers of other future ninja. Something had apparently gone wrong somewhere, and their precious daughter had suffered without him noticing as a result.

"Why did you apologize to him?!" his wife asked as they left the building. "Considering how rude and unhelpful he was when I asked for his help, that drunk should've been apologizing to me!"

"Do you have any idea who he is?!" he asked his wife, shocked that she would continue to talk like that after everything that had happened. "He's a member of the Hokage's Council of Advisors, which means that in the village hierarchy, he's second only to the Hokage, and you pissed him off! It's no wonder I got fired, I'm amazed that we haven't been killed yet!"

Barako blanched at that, finally beginning to see why he had been adamant that she be quiet for once in her life. Hopefully, the lesson would sink in, and she wouldn't dig their family's hole any deeper. He wanted them to be there for their daughter when she returned, she would obviously be needing them, and needing them to fix whatever it was they had done wrong, if what the old man had said was true.

* * *

Tetsuo grinned when they finally got the show on the road after the last checks of the statues were made. They should've been on the road yesterday in order to give the team a bit of a safety margin, and time to prepare before the mission, but they had been delayed by the complete assessments of his new students' skills that he'd been forced to make. The coming mission was one that he was looking forward to, particularly considering the fact that food would be provided.

About a day away from here, as the new Genin walked, a small town that was located near the border between the Land of Fire and the Land of Hot Water was trying to put itself on the map by hosting some sort of autumn cider festival. His team had been given the low C Ranked mission of providing security for the event, which would mainly consist of making sure the drunks didn't get too rowdy. The pay was going to be a bit low for that sort of C Rank, but the fact that they would be given all the food they could eat while they were there more than made up for it. Hopefully, Naruto's version of the C-Rank curse wouldn't kick in and cause things to go too terribly wrong this time...

The town that lay on the road ahead of them was going to be an interesting test for the Haruno girl who was beginning to show signs of progress. It would be interesting to see whether or not she would promptly return to old habits the instant she returned to civilization where she would be provided with most of the comforts of home including a bed, a bath, and food she didn't have to hunt down and prepare for herself. It would also be interesting to see if she returned to that little diet of hers or not after she had learned the true meaning of hunger over this past week. Hopefully, the lessons he'd been trying to impart throughout the entire trip will have stuck, and the girl wouldn't destroy the progress she had made.

Sasuke was less of a concern for him because he was reasonably certain that the boy would behave the same wherever he went unless he got wind of a rumor that his brother was in the area. It was one of the boy's stated goals to kill Itachi after all. Since the presence of Itachi, who by all accounts had avoided Fire Country after the Massacre, was highly unlikely, the boy would most likely stand around brooding until his shift was over when it was his turn for guard duty.

Of the three, Naruto was the most worrisome of all, and not for the reasons most would think. While the risk of him deciding that he liked the new place he'd traveled to where he didn't get glared at, and that he wanted to stay there permanently was slim to none, there was always the chance that they would once again be hit with Naruto's special version of the C Rank curse.

For some strange reason, rather than having something go wrong on only his first C Ranked mission like a normal ninja, something usually went wrong for Naruto on just about every C Ranked mission that he was involved with. The first time this had happened had been when Naruto had had to throw himself under a horse because Satoshi had stolen their travel funds and gambled them away. Afterwards, Naruto had gotten his arm broken in three places while rescuing a baby hawk, nearly gotten himself killed when he had accidentally stumbled upon and broken up a kidnapping ring, and almost died when he ran into a B Ranked Missing-nin in a public restroom, and that wasn't even the half of it.

Somehow, Naruto had come away from each of these encounters alive, mostly unscathed, and with a new friend that he had rescued to boot. One of said new friends happened to be the eternally grateful B Ranked no-longer Missing-nin who had been forced to flee from his village because he had been framed for a crime he hadn't committed, which Naruto had somehow managed to clear him of, enabling him to return home to his family.

He just prayed that something like that didn't happen to the team while they were in town, especially now when they were so fragmented, and didn't look like they'd form into a cohesive unit anytime soon.

**Edited 10-5-12**


	18. Kita and the Book

Yamada Taiga wiped the sweat off of his brow as he pulled the completed draft of a sample edition one of the new Academy textbooks off of the press. If this went well his small publishing house would be commissioned with the job of printing the Academy textbooks in the future, his business would make a great deal of money, and he would be able to expand like he'd been dreaming of doing for years since he'd taken over the small company. If it didn't, well, the fate of the last publisher served as a warning.

By tradition, the Academy textbooks had always been printed by the publishing house that the Nidaime had commissioned to print them upon the founding of the Academy. For two generations and change, that had worked well, as the texts produced by that publishing house had been of good enough quality that there had been no complaints. After the Kyuubi attack, when the younger son who had definite ideas of what was and wasn't appropriate for children, and may have been in the pocket of the Uchiha Clan before the Massacre, took over however, the quality of the Academy texts took a sharp drop. Apparently, the poor man who was currently entertaining the T&I department had omitted one too many important historical facts in order to make the books more appropriate for children, and the Hokage had finally taken offense.

As he ran one of Konoha's two other publishing houses, he had been contacted for a potential contract to print the Academy texts in the future. All of that hinged on whether or not the Hokage liked the version of the Academy history text that he'd just made more than he did his much larger rival's however. Both he, and his rival had been given texts which they were supposed to base their sample texts on yesterday, and given twenty-four hours to create a prototype, despite the fact that such a process usually took weeks or even months.

He had gone all-out from the moment he had received the book he had been given, and had not once stopped for rest as he hurriedly researched everything he needed to bring the text up to date, and selected the materials that he would use for the sample edition, being careful to pick things that he could get alot of on short notice on the off chance his text had been selected.

With the expense the village would be incurring on this project in mind, he had of course done his best to potentially save the village money on his edition of the Academy History text as well as print it according to the Hokage's guidelines. One of the ways he had done this was to print all of the formerly glossy color pictures in black and white, which may be the decision that destroyed his chances considering the fact that his book didn't look anywhere near as attractive or engaging to young minds as the sleek brightly colored editions that were going to be fueling a fire somewhere.

In an attempt to make up for this, when he went down to the archives for pictures of more recent historical events, he chose one of the action shots that had been taken during the Third War for the photo of the Yondaime rather than his inauguration close-up, and one of the more haunting photographs of Uzushiogakure from after its fall, as well as one of the few actual shots of the Kyuubi that had been taken during the attack. And, for the older events, he had checked to see if the archives had any better images than the ones which had been supplied in the older text. He had found a rather brotherly shot of the Shodai and Nidaime Hokages standing together which looked rather promising, and had used it rather than individual photos of the first two Hokages in order to save a little more on the cost that was incurred when printing photographs.

As he was looking over the text, checking for potential errors which would most definitely cause his version to fail and give the contract to his rival, a man walked in. Based on the way the man's eyes kept flicking nervously towards the Help Wanted sign he'd placed in the window earlier that morning in anticipation of an increase in business, it was obvious what the man who looked like he'd recently gone through a rough time wanted.

"Tell you what," he said to the man before he introduced himself and started on what looked like a near hopeless spiel about why he was right for the job, "If you can convince the Hokage to adopt my version of the Academy textbook, you can have the job. If not...There won't be a position for you to fill."

On the surface, it seemed to be an irrational and somewhat unreasonable demand to make of a potential employee, but the reason he was doing this was because he was very poor at public speaking and giving sales pitches, which was why his business was so small in the first place. Despite the fact that he held some small hope that his version of the text would be selected, he knew that he would be too nervous to speak in front of the Hokage, too afraid that he'd flub something and lose the contract.

He'd been planning on asking his cousin who was off-duty today to make the pitch since he'd been in the Hokage's presence enough times to be used to it but, a man who looked to have little left to lose, and every last one of his hopes riding on this however...That sort of man would either be able to sell Fire Country tea to the people in Tea Country, or he would bomb spectacularly. Either way, the man wouldn't do any worse than he himself would do in front of the Hokage, and might actually be able to open his mouth in front of the man and have something intelligible come out. As a bonus, if he sent his potential employee, he wouldn't have to bribe his cousin by printing something that was more than likely illegal on at least half the continent.

Considering how happy the man had looked at the prospect of even having a chance at a job, he almost felt sorry for him. He would be feeling a bit sorrier for them both if the man failed, which was almost a given since his rival was a much larger publisher, and about the only thing he printed that made money was a reasonably well received magazine on household tips for housewives that had a decorating advice column which he wrote himself each month. But, there was a slim chance that the both of them would be able to get what they wanted right now, which was better than the none that there would be if he went to speak with the Hokage himself.

After giving the man the figures he asked for, and wishing the man luck, he watched him depart with his hope in his hands. It was a small hope, but it was a hope nonetheless. If the man turned out to be a spy from the rival company, which he began to suspect he was based on the questions he asked however, he wouldn't bother hiring ninja, he would kill him himself.

* * *

As soon as he departed the publisher's, Haruno Kita went somewhere quiet and sat down with the book that he had been given in order to familiarize himself with what was potentially his only chance at securing a job in Konoha. It wouldn't do to have the Hokage ask him a question about the text, only for him to end up floundering for the answer. Fortunately, Sakura had inherited her speed-reading talent from him, and he was able to put it to good use. After flipping through the book, he went to a nearby convenience store, and purchased a notepad in order to make notations of things that could be changed in the second draft of the book if necessary.

As soon as he was finished making notes on the text, he went home, changed in order to make himself more presentable, and headed to the Administration complex in order to seek an audience with the Hokage. When he was ushered into the man's office alongside the representative from the other publishing company who was holding a rather slick looking book that had apparently just come off the presses less than an hour before, it was to find a bunch of Chunin, one of whom he vaguely recognized as having been a teacher of Sakura's, grouped around the Hokage's desk, flipping through a set of old books, and discussing something.

"Ah," the Hokage, who was standing surrounded by the group of Chunin, pointing at a particular passage in one of the books, said when he looked up and took note of his and his companion's presences. "I see that the representatives from the publishers are here."

After receiving an indication that he should do so, he nervously strode forward and set the book he was carrying down on the Hokage's desk at the same time as the other publisher in a move that almost seemed choreographed despite its spontaneity. Compared to the sleek and beautifully colored example that the other publisher had run off, his offering looked rather paltry, as the choice of color that the publisher had selected for the cover was one that wouldn't be ruined by dirt or grass stains. Frowning slightly, the Hokage, who was undoubtedly used to seeing the brightly colored covers of the usual textbooks, tapped the clothbound cover of the book he had presented. This didn't bode well for his employment prospects.

"Is there any particular reason for this?" the Hokage asked.

"It was thought that the textbooks would last longer if they were made more durable, and thereby reduce replacement costs." he replied. "The cover can be changed however."

Satisfied, the Hokage nodded and opened both books at the same time in order to compare them. The difference in quality was immediately apparent, as the other text had every page made out of the same slightly glossy paper that his potential boss had reserved only for the photographs in his text. This made the pages of the book he had presented look rough in comparison.

"More cost cutting measures?" the Hokage asked, looking up at him.

"Yes." he replied. "My employer is aware of the potential cost of replacing all of the Academy texts and thought it best to present you with a reasonably cost-effective solution. We are willing to make any alterations that you deem necessary however."

Following that, there was a long question and answer session for him and his counterpart from the other publishers as the Hokage and the Academy Instructors examined both texts. Several technical questions that weren't entirely related to the text were asked which left him sweating and wondering if he had failed before he began. He was an accountant, not a book publisher, or a Ninja Academy graduate like the other man had been, and it showed. Eventually, they were dismissed, and asked to come back tomorrow for the Hokage's final decision.

On the way out, he barely mustered up the courage to ask a question himself. A question that he thought important considering what had recently happened to him and his family.

"Hokage-sama?" he asked nervously.

"Yes?" The Hokage replied from where he was huddled with the Academy Instructors.

"Since you're changing the Academy curriculum, do you think it might be at all possible to add some sort of booklet to send to civilian parents to outline how to properly raise a ninja?" he asked, wondering if he had dug himself into some sort of hole by suggesting that they write something like that down where the enemy could get at it despite how useful it would be for civilians who have absolutely no idea where to begin when raising an Academy student. "My wife was forced to rely on word-of-mouth regarding the care of and training of our daughter, and there may have been some things that she had misinterpreted. A basic dietary guideline and some training recommendations at the very least would have been very useful."

"I'll consider it." the Hokage replied.

"Thank you." he said in relief before he left, glad that the Hokage didn't suggest that he entertain the T&I department for a while for even thinking about asking for something like that.

Eventually, he made his way back to the man who may hire him if all went well to inform him of the Hokage's decision, or lack of one rather, after he wrote down a list of suggestions based on the Hokage's questioning.

"How did it go?" the man asked in an almost hopeless tone of voice, as if he'd fully expected him to fail.

"The Hokage hasn't made a definite decision yet but, he has called us back for another meeting tomorrow." he replied. "I have however made a list of possible changes to make for the first edition if all goes well then."

"Give them here, and I'll take a look at them." the man said, holding out his hand for the notebook in which he had written his ideas.

After handing over the notebook, he headed home, nervously anticipating tomorrow's meeting, and knowing that it would likely be a wasted endeavor. Not only was the other publisher larger, they were more knowledgeable, and they didn't have him working for them. Thanks to the fact that he hadn't payed attention to what was going on under his roof like he should have done, and that he hadn't curbed his wife's more extreme tendencies, he had lost his job, and his good standing in the village. The Hokage would undoubtedly be aware of these facts, which would probably play a part in his decision.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	19. Things Go Right, and Things Go Wrong

The Yondaime Kazekage frowned at the missive he had received from his spy in Konoha. He did not believe for one second that the Hokage had decided to completely retool their Ninja Academy curriculum merely because there had been a traitor amongst their ranks of Instructors. Somehow, the Sandaime, whom he'd previously thought to be completely senile, had become aware of his negotiations with the man's former student.

Why else would he choose to replace that cartoon filled dreck that had passed as the Konoha Academy curriculum for the last decade with something decidedly more...militant?

Sighing, he composed a letter to Orochimaru stating that he had received information that the old man who had looked to have been preparing Konoha for a massive de-militarization like the one Yugakure went through before it became a tourist trap had cottoned onto his plans...

* * *

"What're you up to Hiruzen?" Onoki muttered as he leafed through the pages of the glossy and stylish text that his spy had procured for him, having risked his life to run off a copy of the book that was most likely to replace Konoha's current textbooks, and send it to him post-haste in the teeth of his swiftest summon.

Unlike the brief, expurgated texts that had been used in Konoha's Academy for more than a decade, this book was reminiscent of the texts Konoha had used in that period between the Second and Third Wars when they were coming down from one battle, and gearing up for another one. Also unlike the previous text which pretty much had "Konoha is always right, and we never make a mistake" stamped on each and every one of its pages, this history text used actual accounts of battles drawn from source material, and critically detailed strategic errors that had been made by both sides. Though there was no bias against any nation in particular, the tone of the text was decidedly more...militant.

As he was reading through the chapter about the Kyuubi attack which contained what had to be the only cartoon in the entire book, and that being a drawing of the Kyuubi which was meant to be frightening but came off as looking slightly ridiculous, he received a missive from one of his spies in Suna. He quickly set the textbook aside, as this was of higher priority. Suna's increasing militarization had been worrying, especially in light of the rising number of border skirmishes his forces had been having with theirs.

He swiftly opened the coded letter and started reading. By the time he was done, he was laughing. Now that he knew what was going on, he was no longer anywhere near as worried as he had been only five minutes previously but, amused rather. Now that his old rival had stopped smoking whatever herb he'd been putting in his pipe in place of tobacco for the last decade, and pulled his head out of the clouds, Suna was screwed.

* * *

Completely oblivious to the international scramble to make sense of the radical change that was being made to the Konoha Ninja Academy's curriculum, Haruno Kita stood nervously alongside the representative from the other publishing company in front of the Hokage's desk.

"Due to several factors including last night's rather egregious breach of security at one of the publishing houses, which I was potentially expecting to trust to produce texts which contain information that is critical to the safety and security of this village, I have decided to give the publishing contract to your employer Mr. Haruno." The Hokage said. "I have also considered your advice regarding an informational pamphlet for civilian parents of Academy students, and found that it has some merit."

He did his best not to visibly react despite the fact that he felt equal parts relief and elation over the fact that he had managed to secure employment for himself, and a lucrative contract for his new employer that should keep him in a job for a good long while if nothing else went wrong. Thanks to those conflicting emotions, he simultaneously felt the need to sag in relief and jump for joy, though he struggled to do neither. He would of course be studying everything he could get his hands on about the publishing industry the instant he got home so he wouldn't disappoint his employer after starting off so impressively.

"If you would get your employer so we can go over the finer details of the contract and changes to be made to the text..." the Hokage prompted, dismissing him and his counterpart whose expression was rather sour.

He did his best not to run out of the Hokage's office and all the way down to the publisher's. If he was this thrilled, he could only imagine how his new boss would feel when he told him.

* * *

At the Konoha Ninja Academy, Hyuuga Neji, Tenten, and Rock Lee found themselves sitting in an auditorium that was filled with just about every student who had either graduated or failed to graduate the Academy in the last four years. That morning, when they had met at their usual training ground for their usual training, their sensei Maito Gai had told them that they had been called back to the Academy, and that their regular training schedule was cancelled until further notice. He didn't look or sound very happy as he informed them of this. As they sat there in the middle of the crowd on one of the packed benches and tried to figure out why they had been called back to the Academy, Tenten and Lee putting forth even wilder theories with every passing minute while he pretended to ignore them as wild theories of his own ran unchecked through his mind, one of the Instructors stood before the podium that had been set up at one end of the auditorium.

"I believe that most of you are aware of the reason why Assistant Instructor Mizuki is no longer with us." the scarred man who looked to be about a decade older than the team said. "Because of Mizuki's treachery, it has been decided that all students who have passed through the Academy during his tenure will be re-evaluated. From now until January, all students who are studying under a Jounin Instructor will be expected to return to the Academy twice a week for remedial study in areas they may be lacking. As for all others, you will be expected to return to the Academy five times a week before you will be given another shot at the Graduation Exam in January. This means that for some of you who may believe that your chance at becoming a ninja was unfairly taken from you, you will be given a second chance to prove your worth."

There was a great deal of noise at this announcement. There were cries of shock and indignation, cheers, and whispers running through the crowd as people processed what the Instructor had just said and reacted either positively or negatively depending on their situation. Neji remained silent through it all, as did Lee, but both for different reasons. Neji because he was certain that he wasn't lacking in any areas thanks to the superior education he had received from his clan, and Lee because he was worried that he would be found lacking despite the thousands of hours of hard work he had put in to improving himself.

The Instructor gestured for silence.

"Do not celebrate too soon." the Instructor said. "This will not be easy, especially since the curriculum for the Academy has recently been changed, and we will be studying from the new texts as soon as the first sets of books are ready."

There were a great many yells of surprise at this, and even Neji himself looked slightly stunned by the announcement. Before the noise could turn into anything more than a dull roar however, the Instructor who was speaking for the Academy used a strange jutsu that grew his head to massive proportions, and yelled for quiet, stunning the crowd into silence.

"Good, now that I have your attention, I am going to give out the schedule for the testing which will be taking place over the next three days..." The Instructor said before listing said schedule.

* * *

Sasuke barely suppressed a yawn of boredom as he stood watch over the drinks tent. The small town cider festival that he and his team were running security for would be lasting until the end of the week. So far the whole thing had been a snoozefest as far as he was concerned, with the only thing interesting happening being Sakura.

When Sakura had discovered that most of the food they were being given had apples in it in some way shape or form, she had looked like she was about to completely snap, and he was reasonably certain that the Uzumaki had prevented a bloodbath when he had offered to judge the baked good competition in Sakura's place after Tetsuo had offered her services for the job. Fortunately, the otherwise completely uncultured boy had proven to have a refined enough palate and a large enough vocabulary of food terms to satisfy the competitors' concerns over his suitability for the position.

He suppressed another yawn as he watched the rather laid-back villagers continue to get drunk on the locally made cider and applejack. Everyone else looked as tired as he felt, and since it was so early in the evening, the odds of a fight breaking out were much lower than they were during Kakashi or Tetsuo's shifts. Not that any had done so yet mind you. In fact, the guys he was watching were more likely to pass out in their drinks like that one guy was doing right now.

As he watched more and more of the local drunks and a few merchants who had stopped by the town to check out the festival with an eye on possibly investing in the event next year pass out, an alarm started going off in the back of his mind.

Something was obviously seriously wrong.

As he turned to leave and alert Kakashi or Tetsuo to the situation, he collapsed to the ground, and his own consciousness rapidly faded. As his eyes closed, a pair of strangers stepped into view, stopping a few paces away from where he was lying, unable to move.

"Is that everybody?" one of the strangers asked.

"Yeah." the other said somewhat nervously. "You know, when I saw the ninjas, I thought we were dead..."

The first man snorted.

"Ninjas generally don't notice "civilians" until it's too late." the man said derisively, a sneer evident in his voice. "It's like we're invisible to them or something. Did you find where the two big ones holed up when they realized they'd been drugged?"

"No." the second man said.

"Leave it. We've got to get out of here before they wake up, otherwise we really will be dead." the first said.

It was at that point that everything went black. When he came to an unknown amount of time later, it was to find that he was bound, and that he'd been blindfolded. He could feel a warm body next to his. It felt to be about his size, possibly a little smaller, and the regular breathing seemed to indicate that whoever it was was asleep.

"I still say we should take his eyes." a voice said from an unknown distance that was far too close for his comfort.

"We don't know if he has the Sharingan or not, and if he doesn't, they're worthless." another voice piped up from a little further away. "Not all of the Uchiha had them you know, and if that one did, Konoha would be crowing about it. Besides, we need them in good condition for sale."

There was a sigh and the sound of footsteps as the one who had casually suggested removing his eyes moved away.

Everything went black again.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	20. Just What Did You Get Us Into?

When Sasuke next awoke, it had been to a yell that was cut off by an oddly liquid sounding gurgle. He did his best to pretend he was still unconscious as he heard the thud of a body hitting the floor and the faint footsteps of an approaching ninja. Just because one of his kidnappers had been killed, didn't mean that the person who had done the deed was friendly. Pretending to be unconscious however didn't stop him from tensing up when the stranger started cutting his bonds.

"I know you're awake Sasuke." the Uzumaki said as he unbound his hands.

"How?" he asked, wondering how the Uzumaki had managed to get loose and free them when he was barely able to move, much less remain conscious.

"I'm generally immune to most drugs and poisons, which is really lousy when I have a headache. If it's used on me once, it usually won't work again." The Uzumaki replied as he patted him down, checking him for injuries. "I came to on the way in, and they were forced knock me out manually when the crap they used on Saida didn't work on me again even though they used a concentrated dose. They wouldn't have been able to manage that if I hadn't still been a little groggy."

"But how did you...?" he asked, as the Uzumaki undid the blindfold.

"Caused a distraction and slipped out." the Uzumaki said as he displayed a storage seal that was inside the rolled up sleeve of his jacket. "Despite that nasty trick with the "civilians", not everyone here is one, and it seems that not all of the ninja of Yugakure were willing to slip into a peaceful lifestyle. After I saw what I was up against, I went for help."

"So Kakashi and Tetsuo are..." he started, wondering exactly how weak he was if he was in this condition and just about everyone else had already gotten better.

"Probably still back in Saida in roughly the same shape you are now." the Uzumaki replied as he sawed through Sakura's bonds with a kunai.

"Then who...?" he asked as he struggled to stand.

"A group that we will be paying with our services in exchange for the assistance they provided." the Uzumaki replied as he picked up Sakura who was still unconscious.

"Our services...?" he asked, wondering exactly what services the Uzumaki was referring to, as it wasn't unheard of for ninja to trade certain...favors in exchange for other favors. Usually, it was Kunoichi who did that sort of thing, but...

"They're going to raid these bastards' main base over in Hot Water Country, and they need a little back-up in case things go south." the Uzumaki replied as he offered him the hand that wasn't busy supporting Sakura who had been slung over his shoulders in a fireman's carry.

The Uzumaki helped him outside, seemingly unconcerned about the dead bodies that were strewn about the kidnappers' former hideout, and helped him over to a convenient nearby log where he could sit down. As soon as he was seated, the Uzumaki gently set Sakura down at his feet and moved over to the wall of the building that he and Sakura had been held in and started writing on it with a marker he had pulled out of a storage seal that had been stitched into the inside of one of his sandals.

"What are you doing?" he asked as he watched the Uzumaki cover the wall in graffiti.

"Leaving Tetsuo-sensei a note so he knows what's going on and not to attack the help." the Uzumaki replied.

As he started to wonder why their sensei would attack the people who had helped them, a stranger who was carrying a couple of unconscious children slid out of the shadows. Despite the fact that the man was a shinobi, he had never seen the man before in his life and, upon further examination, he knew why that was. The metal plate on the man's hitai-ate which glinted faintly in the light coming from the building they had just exited bore the symbol of Kirigakure.

"Is this the help you're offering?" the masked man, who was bare-chested except for a belt on which a massive sword had been hung, said. "They're just a couple of weak looking brats."

"Chill." the Uzumaki said. "Sasuke's a solid Chunin in everything but actual rank, and Sakura's a genius. Besides, we've got two Jounin on the way, and I might be able to secure you a bit of extra pay for rescuing that lardass' children."

"You walk yet Sasuke?" the Uzumaki turned and asked him after placating the stranger. "We need to get the hell out of here before these guys' buddies come around wondering why they haven't kept in contact."

He stood back up, and staggered in a rough circle. He was still a bit wobbly but, he could walk. He was apparently too slow though because, the masked man frowned and muttered something that he was reasonably certain was uncomplimentary before signing something to someone who was behind him. He didn't know what the sign was because it was in Kiri, but he quickly figured out the meaning when a stranger picked him up and slung him over his shoulder. As he tried to struggle out of the man's grip, a man in a cloak picked up Sakura.

"Don't struggle Sasuke." the Uzumaki said as he tried to get back to the ground. "It'll only waste time we don't have and increase our chances of getting killed when these guys' buddies show up and find out what we did to them."

Growling at the indignity of it all, and the fact that he was so weak that he had to be carried like a little baby, he stopped fighting the man who was carrying him. As soon as the man who was holding him was sure of his grip, the group departed, taking to the trees, and weaving through a circuitous route that frequently doubled back on itself.

"You know," the Uzumaki said after a while. "I know a little trick that'll get trackers off our tail and hurry this along."

The masked man snorted at this.

Though he couldn't see it, he could hear a number of the Uzumaki's shadow clones burst into existence, shadow clones which the Uzumaki was famous for throughout Konoha for some strange reason. He didn't know what the big deal about them was. He'd had a cousin who could make five of the things but, was otherwise unremarkable. Based on the noise the man who was carrying him made, the Uzumaki had done something that he considered to be amazingly impressive.

Their route became a bit more straightforward after that, with occasional pauses for the Uzumaki to summon even more shadow clones, before it eventually ended in a seaside cave whose entrance had been disguised. As soon as they had entered the cave that was much larger inside than its low and narrow opening seemed to suggest, the man who had been carrying him had set him down. As he struggled to rise, the masked man and the man who had been carrying Sakura, who was wearing a rebreather like the one the man who had carried him was wearing, gently set their charges down by a small fire that had been set in an area of the cave that had an exceedingly high ceiling.

After stretching to work out kinks in muscles that had begun to cramp after his being carried for hours after being stuck in an uncomfortable position for who knew how long, he made his way over to the fire. As he sat down, Sakura awoke and began to panic. The Uzumaki quickly went over to her and began to calm her down.

"Chill out Sakura, you're safe." the Uzumaki said. "These guys are...allies."

The girl calmed down after that. Her panicked breathing eased and, rather than pulling further away from the fire, she claimed a spot next to the Uzumaki who then turned to a rather effeminate looking boy who was examining the small children that they had brought with them, having set his bound burden against a far wall of the cave where it would have to get past all of them in order to escape.

"Are the kids going to be okay Haku?" the Uzumaki asked, looking concerned.

"Their breathing is regular, which is a good sign." the boy who could easily be mistaken for a girl replied. "I do not know when they'll regain consciousness however."

"So, how did we get here?" Sakura asked, having taken comfort in the Uzumaki's presence and regained her courage.

"After I escaped, I ran into Zabuza and his buddies who were sneaking up on our kidnappers in hopes of capturing one of them in order to get information on their group's main base. I thought that they might've been in on it until Haku convinced me otherwise. I exchanged our services for your rescue, and here we are." the Uzumaki replied.

"Our boss for the time being is Momochi Zabuza." the Uzumaki continued as he pointed to the bare-chested masked man who wore grey pants and some rather ugly arm and leg warmers who was tending to his massive sword. "That boy there is Haku, that's Gozu, and that's Meizu. I don't know who the other two are because they weren't with us when Zabuza went on his little raid."

"I'm Tokai Renji." the blond man with warm brown eyes who also wore a Kiri hitai-ate said.

"I'm Tokai Mai." the woman whose white hair carried a faint bluish tint who was seated at Renji's side said.

"It's nice to meet you." Sakura said relaxing some more.

He himself wasn't nearly as happy about meeting this group, and he sure as hell wasn't going to relax around them. Right now, he knew very little about them aside from the fact that they were presumably from Kiri, and that there was nothing to stop them from overpowering the Uzumaki and selling him like his previous captors had been talking about doing. That and, if they were on the up and up about their motives regarding him and his team, the situation seemed somewhat shady. On a mission like this, they should be able to call home for reinforcements, and should have already done so.

Just what had the Uzumaki gotten him involved in?

* * *

As the sun rose over the horizon, Kakashi did a quick kata in order to gauge his current speed and reflexes. He was currently a little slow due to the drug which hadn't yet been flushed entirely from his system but, he couldn't afford to wait around until he recovered. Just about anything could be happening to Naruto right now if he wasn't already dead. If his current condition was all he had to work with, it was all he had to work with. He just hoped that it would be enough.

"You up to summoning your dogs?" Shimura asked from where he too was checking his condition.

"Yes." he replied before summoning his best and swiftest trackers, and pulling one of Naruto's undershirts from his bag.

"You know." Shimura said gesturing at the shirt. "If I didn't know about the dogs, I'd think that that was kinda creepy."

He didn't deign to give that a response as he set the dogs on Minato-sensei's son's trail, hoping and praying that he hadn't failed him just like he had failed Obito, Rin, and Minato-sensei. Eventually, after about an hour, he came upon a clearing that contained a couple buildings and a number of corpses, shinobi and civilian alike. As he bent to examine one of the corpses which was barely recognizable as such as it had been ripped apart, Shimura, who had gone to investigate the buildings, started laughing.

"I hope you've got something of Sasuke's or Sakura's as well because, Naruto'll have used one of his favorite tricks to confound trackers, and he's going to need us to help him pay off a rather steep bill for services rendered." Shimura said when he came over to see what was so funny.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	21. Waiting

Tetsuo ran, trailing behind Kakashi. With each mile, it became slightly easier to move as the drug that had knocked him, Kakashi, and the entire town of Saida out and killed a couple infants and toddlers cleared from his system. While he knew that Naruto had been alright and had not been writing under duress, and that his teammates had still been alive the night before, he still worried. The people that Naruto and his teammates had left with were Missing-nin, and he had seen the state of the bodies they had left behind. Both Naruto and Sasuke were exceedingly valuable, and the Missing-nin could try to sell them if they decided they could get more out of them that way than whatever they thought their assistance was worth.

With each passing minute, the worry he felt for his students grew greater. While Hot Water Country was small and narrow, there were a million places to hide, and it was entirely possible that Naruto's companions had turned on him just a little further up the trail, and used a different trick to cover their tracks afterwards, a trick that would confound even Kakashi's dogs.

The group that Naruto was traveling with outnumbered them, and there was no telling what level of skill they had, as they had taken out both civilians and shinobi who had looked to be at least Chunin level alike. It was also entirely possible that, rather than planning on double-crossing and selling Naruto and Sasuke, they were using Naruto to reel Kakashi in in order to kill him and take his Sharingan and the bounty that was on his head. If they chose to do so, they would have the advantage, both in numbers, and in the fact that Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura had just become liabilities. Liabilities that could be used or sold after he and Kakashi were defeated, if they weren't killed during the struggle that was.

There was another worry about what would happen if Naruto were put up for sale as well, a worry about what he would have to do if he was placed in that position. If it came down to it, he would have to do what it took to make sure that Konoha's enemies didn't get their hands on the Kyuubi, no matter how much it would kill him to do so.

* * *

"So, what's going on?" Sakura asked Naruto, who was snacking on some cooked fish as he studied a map that Renji had unrolled before them, as she was handed breakfast by the boy Haku who looked to be a couple years older than her.

"Some retired ninja who fancies himself to be a crime boss has been running some sort of kidnapping for ransom ring, and he took the wrong kid this time." Naruto replied as he pointed to a spot on the map and signed something to Renji who frowned and signed something back. "They made the usual threat to kill the kid if the guy went running to one of the ninja villages. Rather than paying up like everyone else did however, this guy hired a group of Missing-Nin, and payed a little extra for them to make an example of the stupid kidnappers. We got dragged into it when the bunch of morons who took us got a little greedy, and decided to do business with a wealthy merchant who had gone to Saida for the festival. The munchkins in Haku's sleeping bag were the reason for the mass drugging."

Missing-nin? MISSING-NIN?! Naruto had them doing business with Missing-nin?! If they survived this, they could get arrested for dealing with Missing-nin, or worse! Every last one of them were criminals and traitors to their villages, and dealing with them rather than turning them in made you the same.

"Naruto, are you crazy?!" she yelled, about to launch into an explanation of why what they were doing was so far beyond wrong that it wasn't even funny.

"Yes." Naruto replied, "Bu,t that doesn't change the fact that they were our best chance of survival at the time, and still are at the moment. As long as we hold up our end of the bargain, everything should be fine."

She almost said something else, something to explain to the boy who was being far too trusting that everything wasn't fine, and wouldn't be, but something about the look in the boy's eyes stopped her. It was then that she knew that Naruto knew exactly how much trouble they were in, and that he was doing his best to hold everything together in order to keep them alive long enough for help to arrive. He was going along with this in order to keep these people who were basically their captors placated. As long as they were placated, they were less likely to be violent.

She'd heard about something like this back in the Academy when they had briefly discussed what you should do if you were captured by the enemy in her Kunoichi classes, but this was the first time she had seen it in action. By offering the sort of service that made them useful, but didn't harm Konoha, Naruto was protecting them from being used in another, less pleasant, manner. As long as the enemy, who was apparently in some sort of bind because they were short on manpower, saw them as being something approaching comrades, they would be far less likely to treat them as prisoners. Naruto was counting on that, and he needed her to go along with it long enough for them to be able to properly plan their escape.

"I hope you know what you're doing." she finally said before turning to the breakfast that Haku had provided her with and started eating.

* * *

"Your friend is very brave." Haku said as he handed the dark haired boy his breakfast.

He had marked the dark haired boy who wore the mark of the now defunct Uchiha clan as the biggest threat of the three. Naruto, whom he'd recognized from that time he'd met him in Kiri, understood the situation he was in full well, and was determined to do what it took to get his team out of it alive. The pink haired girl was weak, and seemed to be content to follow Naruto's lead for now. The dark haired boy however was a different story. He had kept silent practically the entire time he'd been here and, considering how carefully he kept his expressions and body language under control, there was no way of knowing exactly what he was thinking. If the dark haired boy acted, Naruto, who was the strongest of the three by far, and an almost completely unknown element who was capable of creating shadow clones at a rate that would kill an ordinary ninja several times over, would be forced to protect his teammate. In that situation, just about anything could happen, and any one of them could be killed.

The boy just grunted in response to his statement and practically snatched the food he was giving him out of his hand, clearly still not in the mood for conversation. Gozu and Meizu had tried to engage him earlier only to receive a cold shoulder in return.

He sighed and turned to leave and eat his own breakfast before the children woke up. At some point during the night, they had gone from unconsciousness to sleep, and it was only a matter of time before they did.

"He's not my friend." the dark haired boy said behind him.

"What?" he asked, sure that he'd misheard the boy.

"He's not my friend." the dark haired boy repeated.

"Strange." he said eventually. "I apparently incorrectly assumed that he was."

"Why?" the dark haired boy asked sarcastically. "Because we come from the same village we must be friends?"

"No," he replied, amazed that Naruto was trying to protect such a boy. "I had assumed that he was your friend because he put his own life up as collateral in case you or the other one betrayed us."

The boy seemed rather surprised at this, his cold and arrogant mask breaking for once, if only briefly.

"You mean he didn't tell you?" he said, slightly surprised that Naruto hadn't done so, considering the fact that the dark haired boy was the one who was most likely to turn on them, and therefore his biggest liability.

The boy just grunted in response and turned away, indicating the conversation was over.

Sighing, he got up and went over to get his own breakfast, wondering once more why Naruto protected the other boy who apparently wasn't appreciative of what he'd done for him. Even Zabuza-sama, who had repeatedly told him and the others that they were just tools to further his plans, had shown appreciation for what he and the others did for him at times.

* * *

As the feminine looking boy left, Sasuke found his mind reeling. If what the boy had said was true, the Uzumaki had offered up his own life for a chance to rescue him. Sure, as a result of that rescue, they were little more than prisoners but, they were alive, out of the clutches of their kidnappers, and had a chance at surviving the situation they were in without him being sold off to the highest bidder as long as the group they were with saw him as a potentially valuable asset to the team. Something that the Uzumaki had been making an effort at doing while he had rather unwisely alienated himself from the group.

He could see and hear the Uzumaki helping plan the attack that the group was going to carry out against the criminals who had kidnapped him, criminals who employed an unknown number of ninja with an unknown level of skill. For some reason, he was engaging Sakura in the discussion, getting her to parrot lines from useless passages of the Academy texts which she pretty much had memorized. He kept bringing him and his skill in Taijutsu and Ninjutsu up, as well as the fact that Kakashi and Tetsuo were due to arrive at any minute, and that they would be helping with the attack, in order to keep these facts fresh in the missing-nin's minds.

This little show seemed to be keeping Gozu, Meizu, Renji, and Mai entertained, and he noticed a slight relaxing of their guard around his teammates, especially around the Uzumaki whom two of them had already fought alongside and started to see as a comrade. If he didn't find a way to be seen as a comrade or at least not a threat, they wouldn't relax their guard around him like they did the others, and that would further reduce his chances of escape.

That, and if he wasn't seen as useful to the team, they would be more than likely to cut him loose in a way that would benefit them. Missing-nin tended to travel light because they had to, and any dead weight would be gotten rid of quickly. If he didn't want to be seen as being dead weight, he would have to be seen as being useful as something other than potential breeding stock, despite the fact that he was disinclined to cooperate with people who were basically his captors.

He cast his eye around for anything he could use, especially after he'd established himself as being decidedly unfriendly and, worst of all, uncooperative. His eyes landed on the rather bruised prisoner who was restrained at the back of the cave. He felt a smirk begin to form as he realized that he could kill two birds with one stone if he played his cards right, and get his revenge on the man.

Wiping the smirk off of his face, he got up and walked over to the leader of the group who was sitting leaned against the wall with his massive sword at his side, watching everything that was going on in an almost bored fashion.

"What do you want kid?" the man asked when he reached him.

"I was wondering if I could help you interrogate the prisoner." he replied.

"And what would you know about interrogating prisoners?" the man asked, raising a non-existent brow.

"My father might've mentioned a few methods." he said, brutally suppressing the stab of pain he'd felt at the mere mention of his father.

"And, what would your father have known about interrogating prisoners?" the man asked.

He gave the man a look that practically said "Are you kidding me?", despite the fact that he wasn't as confident as he was trying to appear, and the fact that thinking about his father in anything other than general terms was hurting.

"My father was the chief of the Konoha Military Police Force before he died." he replied in what he hoped was an almost offhand manner that didn't betray his emotions because, showing weakness in front of this man would be the worst thing he could do.

"I'll think about it kid." the man said, chuckling as he reached out to touch him.

He dodged, only to find the man standing behind him. As he moved to back away, the man reached over and ruffled his hair as if he were a small and adorable child, rather than a ninja. He clenched his fists and walked off when the man moved aside to let him pass, trying not to react to what had just happened. The last time anyone had done that to him, it had been one of his uncles who was actually a close cousin on the day IT had happened.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	22. The Art of the Deal

Naruto smiled when he saw Pakkun enter the cave. He hadn't seen Kakashi's dogs all that often, but he'd met Pakkun before and liked him. Aside from being one of Kakashi's better trackers, Pakkun was probably the least threatening of the man's dogs. Non-threatening was good right now, because he didn't want his new allies to be spooked and do something that couldn't be taken back as a result.

He was reasonably sure that he had pegged his new allies correctly, but there was always the chance that he'd made a mistake. While he'd learned alot about reading people throughout his life, especially over the last couple of years, he wasn't perfect. He'd made mistakes before, and could do so again. He was reasonably sure that he was right in this case though, and as long as his current allies didn't feel too threatened by his team, things should be fine.

Those amongst the criminal classes tended to divide into two categories. Those whose morals were slightly bent, but drew the line at some things, and those who were beyond redemption and didn't draw the line anywhere. He had pegged this group as the sort who would draw the line somewhere, and do their best not to cross it. These guys weren't the usual rabble that had left their villages for a life on the road as Missing-nin. They had a cause, a cause that had attracted someone like Haku, and the sort that remained loyal to a cause was slightly more likely to keep their promises than the sort that didn't. The fact that they were in a group and that they looked to have traveled together for a long while spoke well for his team's chances of survival because, those who ran in packs tended to be less likely to turn on you unless they viewed you as a threat to their well-being, as those who traveled in packs tended to care for and be able to work with others, and since they had a support system were less likely to become paranoid wrecks.

Since he'd allied himself with Zabuza's group, he had been doing his best to make sure his team wasn't seen as a threat, and working hard to be seen as useful to them. The fact that he, Sasuke, and Sakura were still children in these people's eyes also helped to a degree. Based on the way the children who had been rescued alongside his teammates had been treated, these people would be less likely to harm those they perceived to be children.

Despite the fact that until Pakkun had shown up he'd been more hoping than certain that Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei were alive, he had been frequently warning Zabuza's group about the Jounin so they wouldn't become too startled when they arrived and do something everyone might regret. As long as Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei were willing to hold up their end of the bargain, everything should turn out fine. One mission, and they could all part ways and never see each-other again if they so chose. He'd miss Haku since he had been kind to him both times they had met, but he wasn't sure that he'd miss Zabuza or Mai.

After happily greeting Pakkun who had provided confirmation that both Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei were alive and in good health, he pulled his marker out of his sandal, and a small scroll from the storage seal in the other one. A civilian probably would have expected him to have kept spare weapons in those seals but, there was no point in doing so since the old pulling a weapon from your shoe trick was so old that it was one of the first things a ninja knew to watch out for. It was a good place to covertly stash writing supplies for those times when your only hope might be getting a note out however.

"I'm beginning to see why it took three of the Big Five to bring Uzu down." Gozu said appreciatively as he wrote out a note for Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei. "So kid, you carrying an armory in your underwear?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?" he replied as he wrote out that they were pretty much all fine, and that coming in weapons drawn would put them in an untenable situation at the moment.

Meizu, Renji, and Mai found his rejoinder to be uproariously hilarious for some reason. Their boisterous laughter woke the two kids who started panicking slightly, calling for their father and someone who was probably their nanny. Haku moved in to calm the two crying children who barely resembled the fat slob he'd run afoul of on the first day of the festival as best as he could.

As soon as he was finished with his note, he handed it over to Pakkun to bring back to Kakashi. The instant he did so, Pakkun raced out of the cave as fast as his little legs could take him, which meant that Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei probably weren't in the mood to wait for him, and were probably already gearing up to attack. Hopefully, the note would stop them from doing something rash before it ended in disaster as it was sure to do. Everything was as fine as it could be under such circumstances at the moment, and if it remained so, it'd be great.

* * *

Zabuza watched as the ninken departed. Up until now, he had thought that the boy had been lying about the pair of Jounin being on the way. The boy hadn't sounded convinced of the fact that his sensei and the other one who was most likely guarding the Uchiha while they were outside the village were alive, and he'd been reasonably certain that a group that had managed to successfully knock out said Jounin and escape with a trio of baby ninja, which Konoha ninja tended to be overprotective of, wouldn't be stupid enough to leave the Jounin alive if they had them at their mercy. He'd apparently been wrong however.

About the only reason that he had taken the brats on, aside from the fact that the next mission looked to be a tough nut to crack and that he would need all of the help he could get, including a bit of cannon fodder, had been because the blond Uzumaki had helped Haku get out of Kiri alive when he'd gone to pass that message for him early this year, and he owed the kid who had so far done his best to hold up his end of the bargain rather than run out on them the first chance he got. He wasn't entirely sure what he would've done with whichever of the kids survived the next mission if the Jounin hadn't shown up but, he had leaned towards trying to convince them to join him through whatever means necessary because, he couldn't afford to let them go and put the Hunter-nin on their trail. Based on the pink haired girl's reaction to them upon discovering that they were missing-nin, that was something at least one of them would be stupid enough to do should he let them go.

The presence of Jounin made things more complicated, and potentially made them easier as well. Jounin tended to know all about the sort of under the table deals that made the ninja world go round. Right now, trying to kill him or turn him in wouldn't be to their advantage since he was holding all of the bargaining chips. If he played his cards right, then it was possible that everyone would be able to walk away from the table alive, and with something they wanted. And, as a bonus, the Jounin who should be well aware of the situation in Kiri might be inclined to give them a bit of a head start and possibly even distract any Hunter-nin who might have picked up their trail in exchange for having rescued their precious Genin from a bunch of unscrupulous kidnappers if they were the usual sort of bleeding heart Leaf nin.

After a bit of a wait, the dog returned bearing a missive for the Uzumaki who was apparently team leader because he was the closest to being an actual ninja rather than being a brat who was playing at being a ninja like the pink haired girl and the Uchiha, who had tried to come across as tough but overplayed it and showed his almost complete inexperience, were. After reading the note, the Uzumaki asked how he wanted to arrange the meeting which was the opening of the bargaining session for all their lives.

"You and I will go out and meet them of course." he replied as he strapped his sword to his back.

He'd selected the Uzumaki because he was sure that the kid would be less likely to do something stupid like run the instant he caught sight of his sensei. The kid seemed to have a good head on his shoulders, and was lacking in nothing but experience. Haku had vouched for him, and Haku wasn't the sort to vouch for anybody without good reason.

They both got up and exited the cave at the same time. When they got outside and onto the beach, the two Jounin were standing in the open waiting for them, apparently ready to bargain. His heart nearly stopped when he realized that one of those Jounin was Sharingan Kakashi the Copy Ninja but, who else would be entrusted with the teaching of the Next to Last Uchiha? Considering the Hatake's reputation, if it came down to a fight, there was a chance that none of them would survive. The brown haired ninja that was there with the Copy Nin signed something at the Uzumaki who signed back. The Uzumaki's response apparently satisfied the man because he relaxed fractionally.

"If you gentlemen would step inside my office..." he said, gesturing at the cave, and doing his best to seem unconcerned about the situation which could rapidly devolve into a total shitstorm if it wasn't one already. Ninja generally didn't kill unless they had to and, considering the fact that he had Kakashi's students in what could arguably be considered captivity, the Konoha ninja might just decide that they had to.

There was a bit of shuffling at the cave entrance as each of them did their best not to turn their backs on a potential enemy but, in the end, it was them who were in a lower bargaining position at this point and knew it who had entered the cave first, with him and the Uzumaki following close behind. Upon entering, both Jounin's eyes flicked across the cave, pausing briefly on the Uchiha, the pink haired girl, and the two children, relaxing fractionally when they saw that all were in good health and that they didn't appear to be unduly stressed by their situation. As the Jounin were taking in the situation, he moved to an easily defensible spot in the cave where there was a good wall at his back and no corner to be backed into nearby.

"Momochi Zabuza," the Copy Ninja said eventually, taking on the role of spokesman. "You don't seem to be the sort to take on strays."

"If I think they're actually worth anything, I might." he replied, well aware of how his statement could be taken considering the multiple meanings of the word "worth", especially in the current situation.

Both Jounin's eyes involuntarily flicked towards the Uchiha (expected) and the Uzumaki (not expected), completely bypassing the pink haired girl and the merchant's children as if they were unimportant. Apparently, despite the fact that the Uzumaki clan was all but extinct, and most of the sealing techniques they had been famous for were lost, the Uzumaki was actually worth something aside from his value as a ninja.

"How much are they worth to you?" the brown haired Jounin asked.

"Not all that much really, but the Uzumaki brat did offer your services in exchange for the services we rendered to him, and I would like to receive the agreed upon payment." he replied, doing his best to sound casual despite the tense situation. "Besides, it'd be a bit too troublesome to try selling the Uchiha in my current position. It would attract all sorts of unwanted attention."

His moving the possibility of him selling the Uchiha off to the highest bidder off the table should put the two further at ease, and stop them from doing something drastic to get him back. As long as there was a chance of them doing so, they would probably keep towards non-violent approaches of negotiation. There was less of a chance of the Uchiha being accidentally killed in the crossfire that way.

"Exactly what are our services needed for?" the Copy Ninja asked.

"Just your standard smash and grab on a crime-lord's hideout." he replied. "The client wanted them to be made an example of, so there's no real need to be neat about it so long as we get the hostage out alive."

"And, after the mission we go our own ways and pretend we never met?" the Copy Ninja said eventually.

"That was the general idea." he replied. "Though if you have something else to offer, I would be open to bargaining."

The pretend they never met bit was the most valuable part of the bargain at the moment as far as he was concerned. While he needed cash, and lots of it, he couldn't overthrow the Mizukage if he was dead, and with Hatake Kakashi as an opponent, that was a very real possibility. With the head start that their team's pretending they never met would provide, he should be able to get away and find another lucrative job that would provide him with much needed funds. There were plenty of unscrupulous men with a lot of money out there who were perfectly willing to hire missing-nin after all, and after his next mission was complete, there would be one less of them in the world.

"Yes, I suppose you do deserve some compensation for rescuing Shimura's Genin and Futoru Kinmaru's children, and housing them for the night." the Copy Ninja said. "We were offered a great deal of money to rescue that pig Futoru's little darlings, and it would be completely unfair of us to not share that pay with with the people who did all of the heavy lifting."

He almost collapsed in relief over the fact that the Hatake was willing to seriously talk business. Things could have turned into a massive bloodbath if he hadn't been, and he didn't only have himself to think about. The first to die in this situation would have been Gozu, Meizu, Renji, and Mai, as they were merely Chunin, and didn't have any special talents that were worth writing home about, and it would have been really crappy if they had followed him this far only to die now.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	23. First Kill

As Kakashi and Zabuza bargained, the Hokage read the second letter that had come from that team that day. The first message he'd received that morning from Kakashi and Tetsuo, who had used the Saida town messenger hawk which was reserved solely for emergencies, had been exceedingly worrying. This one, which had arrived via dog, was less worrying, but concerned him greatly nonetheless. Bargaining with missing-nin was always a dangerous prospect. While as a whole, missing-nin tended to be a mixed bag as far as morals and ethics were concerned, they were all willing to do what it took to survive, even kill people who had considered them to be their allies if they thought it was necessary.

While he was loathe to do so, he would wait for another message from Kakashi to arrive before sending out a search party. A team of ANBU popping up at the wrong moment could turn what would otherwise have been a dangerous but otherwise relatively stable situation into a deadly one that could have catastrophic consequences for everyone involved, especially if Sasuke or Naruto were killed in the crossfire. Besides, there was a strong possibility that any team he sent right now would show up too late to be of any use, either too late because the team had already dealt with the situation, or too late because Naruto's team was dead, either way, too late.

All he could do for the situation right now was wait. Wait and hope.

* * *

Mitokado Homura sighed as he watched his teammate sit there and do nothing. There had been a time when the man would have promptly taken action if he'd learned that a fellow Konoha ninja was being held captive by missing-nin. Now however, the man was content to sit back and deal with the criminals as if they had any right of being bargained with rather than killed like the traitors to their village they were.

He would have to do something, something other than to go to Danzo over this, as the man held enough leverage over him, and didn't need more. This would be a bit difficult however because, unlike Danzo, he didn't have a private army of ANBU at his beck and call, and the regular ANBU had all been ordered to double check all orders given to them by the Council with the Hokage after the incident with Itachi.

Speaking of Itachi, he wondered how the poor boy would feel if he learned that his precious little brother had been captured by missing-nin...

* * *

Danzo studied the situation report he'd received from the operative he'd had discreetly following the Boy's team. The situation the Boy's students were in was rather interesting to say the least, and he would continue to follow it to see how it would play out, considering the fact that the group that the Weapon had allied himself with was apparently gearing up to remove a minor thorn from his side. Of course, Momochi Zabuza had the potential to become an even bigger thorn in his side later on but, at the moment, he was useful. Not only had the man removed a couple of problems before he had been forced to deal with them but, the search for him also tied up a small portion of Kiri's forces.

Despite the fact that he had no intention of doing so, and was doing this for his own reasons, Zabuza was doing him and Konoha a favor. If that group of criminals who had made their base in Hot Water Country weren't gotten rid of soon, it was possible that the small coastal nation would be taken over by them and return to being a militarized state, as that was one of the leader's stated goals. This would of course not be helpful to Konoha, as the demilitarization and subsequent restructuring of Yugakure had removed one of the threats that constantly surrounded the village.

Despite the violent reputation that preceded them, Zabuza's band was a bunch of political dissidents rather than the usual criminal trash that became missing-nin. That didn't mean that they wouldn't kill if doing so would further their cause though. From the reports that he'd had compiled on the man who might have a chance at becoming Mizukage upon Yagura's death, he had learned that Zabuza had a sense of honor, and something of a soft spot for children. Both of these traits were things that the Weapon, who had been smart enough to use all available resources in order to ensure his team's survival, could use to his advantage.

So far, things had been stable in regards to the Boy's team's situation, and looked to remain that way for the immediate future. It wouldn't do to do something rash and risk losing the Weapon, especially not when the Weapon and the group he was with were preparing to take out a threat to Konoha's security. He would send a team with orders to not interfere unless the situation looked to be becoming untenable. Otherwise, there was no point in risking Konoha's valuable resources, especially in a situation that might sort itself out by the time the team got there sometime tomorrow.

* * *

"Deal." Kakashi said, offering his empty hand for the leader of the group of missing-nin now that they had reached an accord that both had found reasonable.

The other man briefly took his hand. Their hands clasped for a shake for an instant before they simultaneously let go, not wanting to be in the other's prime killing range any longer than necessary. Both had acquired international reputations for being indiscriminate killers, though, considering what Zabuza had done to earn his moniker, his reputation had been well deserved.

"I was thinking we'd go in tonight." Zabuza said as he moved to a spot that was more comfortable for him. "The sooner we get this done and get gone, the better."

"What's the plan?" he asked, hoping that the other man had something other than rush in, kill everybody, and hope the hostage was still alive when they reached him.

"We're still working on that." the man named Renji said. "We've mostly got one hammered out, but we need a few details filled in."

The man rather pointedly looked at the prisoner the group had taken, making his meaning very clear to everyone including the moron who had thought he could get away with drugging and kidnapping Konoha ninja. The almost eager look in Sasuke's eyes when the man had made that statement unsettled him slightly. If the kid wasn't already well on his way to becoming a basket case, he would introduce him to Ibiki. The two of them would probably get on like a house on fire.

Over near the fire, Shimura and Meizu were bundling the small children in preparation for travel. It had been agreed that one ninja from each team would bring the children back so there would be no accusations of underhandedness when it came to collecting and distributing the promised pay for the children's safe return. After the pay was given, Shimura would send Konoha's share back to Konoha along with a report so all of the proper paperwork could be filled out, and the pay distributed correctly according to mission pay guidelines.

Hopefully, Shimura would be able to get there and back before they started the raid on the crime boss' base, which was located in the far southern end of the country. While he was gone, they would be interrogating the prisoner and preparing for tonight's mission. Since Sasuke was so eager to join in on the torture, he thought he'd let him. It would probably be better to see how the kid reacted to blood now since it'd just suck if he was stuck rescuing the boy because he'd had some sort of flashback in the middle of the base attack and froze up or went psycho or something.

"So, which one of you lot is going to do the Interrogation?" he asked.

"That'd be me." the woman named Mai replied.

"Mind if my student joins in?" he asked. "Sasuke seems to think he needs a little experience in that area."

"Sure." Mai said with a sweet smile that frankly scared the crap out of him. "I'll be sure not to scar him too badly."

He snickered at Sasuke's nervous swallow as the boy followed Mai over to the prisoner.

* * *

Several hours into the interrogation, Sasuke was doing his best not to throw up. Hearing about these kinds of things as they were being bantered about over drinks when Mom was away was one thing, actually seeing them being done was something else entirely. Was this why his father had hated his job with the police? If so, why did he brag about these things with his officer relatives when he had a few drinks in him?

The interrogation had started out simply, with words, then with words and the occasional blow and/or offer thrown in amongst the questioning. The prisoner had remained silent throughout it all. Then things got violent, and had later started moving beyond mere violence into something that was purely sadistic, until finally the prisoner began to speak. Throughout it all, Mai had kept smiling like it was just a game to her. He however had wanted to leave several times, but hadn't managed to muster up the courage to do so, for fear of having the woman's attention be turned towards him.

There was blood on the walls and the floor of the small side cavern they had commandeered for the interrogation, and the prisoner was making small keening noises, begging to die.

"Well little boy, it's time you became a man." Mai said as she handed him a kunai.

He looked down at the kunai, and at the prisoner who was barely recognizable as a human being now. He hesitated. He'd never killed a person before, and when he'd imagined doing so, as he frequently did in regards to Itachi, it had not been like this. He felt shame over hesitating. He was a ninja, he was supposed to kill. What sort of ninja would be reluctant to kill when it was part of their job?

"Finish it." the woman said.

He moved slightly shakily to the prisoner who was bound to a rock, and brought the kunai down, closing his eyes as he did so.

"Next time, don't close your eyes little boy. You could get killed that way." Mai said as she pulled the kunai from his unresisting fingers when the deed was done.

As he entered the main cavern where the rest of the group sat waiting, he found himself wondering if this had been how Itachi had gone mad. ANBU were required to do worse things than normal ninja in the course of their jobs. As he sat down, he found himself looking over at his teammates who were seated huddled together, going over some aspect of the plan. Sakura seemed to notice that he was looking at them first. When she caught sight of him, there was horror in her eyes. The Uzumaki looked up next. Rather than looking at him in horror, he looked at him in understanding. Kakashi however, the look in the man's eyes was completely blank.

"Well then, that just leaves Sakura." the silver haired man said with a shrug before going back to the map that the trio had been huddled over.

As he sat there wondering why he couldn't be so casual about death, the boy who had handed him his breakfast that morning sat down next to him.

"What do you want?" he asked, wishing the boy would go away and leave him alone.

"My first time wasn't all that easy either, neither was every time after." the boy who had made no move to leave said. "There's something wrong with you if it is. You do it though because you have to."

"Tell that to my- that bastard who slaughtered my clan." he snorted.

Did it because he had to? Yeah right. That bastard did it because he was nuts, and if he ever found the S.O.B who had helped him, he was dead meat too. Even if killing made him want to puke his guts up.

"When people don't have something precious to hold on to, a reason for doing, a reason for being, they get lost." the boy said quietly. "Sometimes they find someone who will give them a path, and find the strength to find their way back, and sometimes they remain lost and have to be put down for the safety of others."

"You can't hold onto people, they turn out not to be what you thought they were, they leave, or worse, they die." he replied, snorting at the thought that the Itachi he'd grown up with was merely "lost" somewhere.

"That's why you become strong enough to hold onto them for as long as you can." the boy replied. "It is when you have someone precious to protect that you become truly strong. You have to in order to keep them, and keep them safe. If you have no-one to fight for, you become lost, and lose sight of everything including yourself."

"Avenging my clan will be enough." he replied wanting to end the conversation that was making him feel uncomfortable.

"And, what will you do, and who will you have at your side when you have avenged your clan?" the boy asked curiously. "If you chase everyone away like you do now, you will find yourself standing alone with nothing to do, and nothing to be afterward, and you will be completely empty. I myself may be nothing but Zabuza-sama's tool, but at least I am something, and I have someone precious to me to be that for."

With that, the other boy got up and left, leaving him to think things he had never even wanted to consider before alone. The truth was, while he had paid lip-service to a desire to restore his clan, he hadn't really thought of the future besides becoming strong enough to defeat That Man, and avenging his clan. He had told himself that he would think of the after when it came. But, what if that day that could be years down the line that he was waiting for turned out to be too late like the other boy had said it would?

**Edited 10-6-12**


	24. A Loss

"Unbefreakinglievable." Tetsuo said as he settled down near the fire in the cave that served as the hideout for Momochi Zabuza's little gang, setting the pack he'd carried back from Saida down at his side.

He'd been running all day, and while he could keep it up for another day or so without too much hardship under normal circumstances, it wasn't fun, and these weren't quite normal circumstances. He'd been forced to recover from being drugged on his feet, and then forced to deal with the situation back in Saida. As a result, he felt almost completely drained, which wasn't good considering the coming mission.

As he sat down, Meizu, who was a bit bloodthirsty but, otherwise not that bad of a person, settled down next to his twin brother Gozu who made up the other half of the moderately famous Demon Brothers. It was clear that he was rather drained from their ordeal as well. The man had gone through a battle, and then ran half the night, before being forced to turn around run all day and before being stuck dealing with the Saida townsfolk. Unlike him, the poor bastard was just a Chunin, and it showed.

"So?" Zabuza asked expectantly.

"That damn merchant stiffed us and riled the town against us." Meizu said angrily. "I'd've killed him, but the bleeding heart Leaf nin stopped me."

He caught the expression on Zabuza's face, and knew it would mean trouble if he didn't deal with it quickly. Konoha's methods of dealing with such situations were generally seen as far too lenient but, they were usually effective, especially when the "big bad ninja" didn't go after the dissidents right away, and let the situation blow over as the average slobs stopped seeing the point in trying to fight against someone who didn't even bother to give them the time of day, and realized that the bastards who'd been stirring them up were just rabble-rousing, and that there was no real threat from Konoha. Usually, long before the unrest reached dangerous levels, the leaders of the crowds tended to be discredited in the eyes of their followers, who then abandoned their cause as there apparently wasn't one. Then, when people started forgetting about their former and now disgraced leaders, Konoha dealt with the bastards who had tried to turn their customer base against them.

It wouldn't do to overly frighten, alienate, or kill off the customer base, otherwise there would be nobody to pay for missions, and Konoha would go broke. If Konoha went broke, they'd all starve.

"As if we'd be so merciful as to kill him now while he's still got everything, especially so soon after he riled up our customers who'll become unsettled if the fat bastard dies or disappears too soon." he replied with a slight scoff. "I'm sure the nice townsfolk of Saida are having fun burying the corpses you guys left behind right now, and in a few days, when that fat slob pisses one too many of them off, they'll remember us, and start eagerly waiting for us to deal with him considering the fact that they'd watched him stiff us after we'd returned his kids safe and sound. Then, when they've all turned against that lardass, we'll start taking it out of his hide nice and slow."

"That sounds like fun but, I'm still out my share of the rescue money." Zabuza replied.

"We'll find a way to compensate you." he replied. "Konoha has some sort of discretionary fund for these sorts of things, and I could send a message back to indicate that we need some money from it."

"Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to hand my comrades some of our supplies that I got from the inn." he said as he handed the pack he'd retrieved from the Saida inn to Naruto.

"What about my bag?" Sasuke asked.

"Had to leave it behind to prove to the guys at the inn that we intended to return in a few days as promised." he said as Naruto dug through his bag and pulled out a storage scroll and frowned when he didn't recognize it. "I made sure to pull out anything you might miss beforehand though in case the idiots get any bright ideas."

Naruto chucked the strange scroll at Kakashi who opened it, and tossed it to Sasuke, as Naruto tossed another scroll he didn't recognize at him and the scroll that contained the medical supplies at Sakura who, fortunately, hadn't had them on her when she was captured. The reason he had gotten Naruto's pack rather than Kakashi's or his own was because it made the best sense to do so. Currently, there were only two seals that Naruto was an expert at making, and that was because the boy practiced with them so often and in such unorthodox ways. The boy was capable of making high quality explosive tags, and could do things with Storage seals that other people swore were impossible. As a result of Naruto's skill with storage seals, his bag was practically a work of art. Aside from the supplies he kept stashed inside the bag, there was a set of spare supplies in the bag itself.

"Looks like everything's here except my apartment." Naruto said after he'd finished examining the supplies that had been packed.

"Yeah, I kinda had to leave your furniture behind because I couldn't see how it would be useful for the job." he replied.

Replacing the lost furniture should the innkeepers back in Saida do something stupid would be a rather expensive undertaking for the boy but, he would find a way to make it up to him somehow if the bastards at the inn destroyed his stuff because that fat merchant who could afford to buy Naruto enough furniture to fill a hundred apartments had rather stupidly decided to save a few hundred thousand ryo by stiffing a team of ninja. If Naruto's belongings became damaged, they'd be yet another thing that Konoha would be taking out of that lardass' hide.

"You'd better get ready, because we're going to leave in an hour." Kakashi said as he leaned back to rest again.

"Crap." he said as he pulled his sandals off in order to rub his sore feet.

"Well, the sooner we get going, the sooner we get this done." Kakashi said as he pulled a dark bandanna over his unruly and easily recognizable silver locks. "I'll fill you in on what you're supposed to be doing."

* * *

Sakura swallowed nervously as she took in the small compound that her team was going to be raiding alongside a group of missing-nin. Since this was an unofficial mission, and Konoha couldn't be implicated if something went wrong, all of them had been forced to leave their headbands and dogtags back in the cave. If she died here, there was a chance that nobody would ever know what had happened to her.

This was going to be her first bit of combat experience, and she'd been ordered to hang back alongside the missing-nin's Medic with the medical supplies so they didn't get caught up in the thick of things and potentially get themselves killed in the crossfire. She didn't know whether to be relieved or disappointed that she was being kept out of the action. On the one hand it showed that Tetsuo-sensei didn't think her capable of handling this mission, and still saw her as a liability. But, on the other hand, it meant that she wouldn't have to kill anybody just yet.

She wondered how she would react if she actually killed someone. Sasuke had looked so...so wrong when he had come back from interrogating their prisoner whose screams had echoed throughout the cave for so long before Kakashi put up some sort of Genjutsu that had made her unable to hear them. There was also something that had gone missing from Naruto since he had graduated from the Academy, and she was reasonably sure she knew why.

What would killing someone take from her if she did it like the other two and just about every other Ninja from Konoha for that matter had done?

After what seemed like an eternity, the signal that the medics were needed came. She and Haku raced into the compound which may or may not have been cleared yet. Based on the urgency of the signal given, someone was badly injured. She hoped and prayed that it wasn't a member of her team as she ran, feeling sick as she took in the sight of the dead bodies that had been strewn in her path as she trailed after Haku who was much faster than she was.

When she reached the group, it was to find Renji cradling his wife Mai who was so badly injured that she didn't even know where to begin while Naruto did everything he could to stop the bleeding. Haku apparently knew what to do however, because he started calling for supplies. Soon, things settled into a pattern where Haku asked for some medical supply whose name she only knew from the inventory book that had come with the med-kit, and she handed it to him.

As Haku worked furiously to save his patient, everyone in the group, which included a boy she didn't recognize, nervously waited to see whether or not Mai would survive. Renji, who hadn't stopped pacing, was the most anxious of the lot. When Haku had started treating Mai, the man had sworn that if she died, he would follow. She had little doubt that the man would carry through on his promise.

Despite the fact that the two seemed to be polar opposites personalitywise, it had been obvious from the first moment she had seen them that they were both very much in love with each-other. The two of them were passionate about each-other in a way that reminded her of the stories in the books she had a habit of sneaking out of her mother's closet, and if the two of them had been characters in such a novel, it would quite likely have been a love story for the ages.

Eventually, after hours of work, Haku had set Mai's broken leg with Naruto's assistance, and either closed or bandaged all of her open wounds. Though it wasn't advisable considering Mai's injuries, the team very carefully got her ready to move because they couldn't hang around here any longer, because someone was eventually going to drop by and investigate. It was uncertain whether or not Mai would survive, but her chances of survival were far better than they would have been had Haku not had the assistance and supplies her team had provided.

The trip back to the cave that had served as the missing-nin's base was far slower and more careful than the trip out had been, and as a result she hadn't had to be carried. Instead, she followed along with the litter, doing her best to keep an eye on Mai's condition, all the while praying that she survived.

This hadn't been the sort of introduction to the practical aspects of being team Medic that she had wanted, but it was the one she got, and she would have to deal with it.

* * *

Zabuza watched anxiously as Mai was gently lowered to the cave floor near the fire. He'd lost enough members of his group already, and if Mai went, so too would Renji. Renji and Mai had been in love since they were children, and neither knew how to live without the other.

Either way, as things stood, he was going to lose Renji and Mai. Whether or not it would be temporarily or permanently depended on Mai's survival. Should Mai live, the group would be separating until Mai recovered enough to be able to join them without slowing them down too much. Renji would naturally be staying by her side until that day came.

All things considered, the mission had gone better than it would have done had the Leaf ninjas not been there. While they could have handled it on their own, there would almost certainly have been at least one fatality amongst the group. One of the fatalities would have almost certainly been Mai who had only survived to this point because Sharingan Kakashi himself had gotten between Mai and the opponent who was killing her.

It had been Mai's bad luck and eagerness for battle that had caused her to be stuck facing the only Jounin level ninja in the compound alone. The leader of the criminal organization may have been retired from active duty as a ninja, but that hadn't stopped him from being a ninja. The man, who'd had a back way out of the base, had kept his skills sharp over the years, and had still been in excellent shape.

It should have been him who had gone up against him, but it hadn't been, and because it hadn't been, Mai and Renji could still die.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	25. Battle Aftermath

Naruto sighed as he flopped backwards onto his sleeping roll which he'd laid out after he'd changed his clothes and washed up a bit in order to catch a few hours of sack time before they left sometime after dawn and headed back to Saida where they weren't going to be getting a warm welcome upon their return thanks to a certain merchant whose kids had been the reason his team had been drugged and kidnapped and several of the Saida children had died in the first place. It had been a rather insane evening, and not one that he was likely to get over anytime soon.

He hadn't run a mission like that in...ever. He'd killed before as part of his job but, not like this. It wasn't just the killing that had made the mission so intense, though he had killed more people during this mission than he had in the entire two years he'd been a ninja, but the fact that he'd been going up against a horde of other ninja, knowing that he was going to be out-numbered and quite possibly outclassed.

When they had gotten to the compound, it had rapidly become apparent that the leader of that little kidnapping for ransom ring that they were going up against had been setting up his own ninja village and manning it with the dregs of ninja society. While a large percentage of the ninja there were washouts, not all of them had been, and the group had been hard pressed to survive because numbers had been very firmly on the enemy's side. In fact, numbers had been so heavily in the enemy's favor that it was ridiculous.

_The compound was larger than he had expected it to be based on the number of ninja who had been hired to storm it. It was roughly the size of a small town, and looked to have a population of at least a hundred._

_As he was beginning to doubt that they could do this, a chilling mist rose from a small nearby pond, and kept rising until the area was blanketed with a near impenetrable fog._

_That was their cue to start. They would run silent for as long as they could._

_They ran from house to house, killing every adult they found. He felt sick over the possibility that many of the adults here could have been innocent civilians who'd been drawn here by false promises but, he couldn't take the chance that, in sparing one of the people in these houses, he would be leaving behind a ninja who could then turn around and stab him or one of his teammates in the back..._

It had all been his least favorite kind of fighting as well. He hated straight-up fighting in areas where he hadn't gotten a chance to set up traps beforehand, and the enemy had an intimate familiarity with the terrain and every opportunity to do so.

_The first clue that anyone had that they were there had been when either Gozu or Meizu - he had a hard time remembering which of the two was which - had set off a basic trap. An instant after the explosion, the compound burst into frantic activity like a kicked-over anthill._

_Everything got blurred and jumbled after that. One second he was sinking his kunai into the gut of a man who had probably never risen above the rank of Genin before he'd washed out of his village's ninja forces. The next, he was slashing the throat of a man who was trying to release something into the air, probably more of that drug that had been used on Saida. After that, he was leaping off of a rooftop and struggling with a ninja who had a headband with the stricken through symbol of the village of Frost on it on the way down to the ground..._

Mai had been the one who had reached the boss' luxurious, if a little small, home first, and had been the one to follow him into his escape tunnel before the door had shut and locked. By the time he had blown the lock, the bastard who had been surprised as hell to see them had been toying with Mai for a long while, taking out his frustration over the destruction of his criminal empire cum ninja village out on her. It had been that frustration that had been the only reason Mai had still been alive when they had reached her, and Kakashi had joined the fight, killing the bastard who had been killing Mai by inches.

_The lock had been some sort of picture puzzle lock like the ones on the Instructors' lunchboxes at the Academy, but more complex. If he could figure out how to take the picture apart, he would be able to get into the tunnel Mai and the boss of this place had gone down like he had gotten into the Instructors' lunch boxes. There had to be a key to it that he was missing..._

_There!_

_Now if he could just figure out how to..._

_POP!_

_He and the others ran down the tunnel the instant the door opened. Mai was still trying to fight back despite the hopelessness of the situation she was in. They all ran to help. Kakashi got there first. As Kakashi fought, Renji raced over to his wife's side, and held her as she lost consciousness._

As he drifted off to sleep, he could hear the cries of the dying men, and the screams of the few children living in the compound who had woken up to find one or both of their parents dead.

He never wanted to take a mission like this again. Each time he killed, it felt as if a piece of him died with his opponent. Tonight, it felt like a large chunk of him had been removed. He could understand killing an enemy before they killed you, and he could understand killing to protect the village or something that was precious to you but, what he had done last night hadn't been the same. Not by a long shot.

* * *

As Naruto struggled to sleep and eventually fell into a nightmare, Sasuke stood in the ocean trying to scrub the blood from his skin and clothing, not caring if a long period in the salt water he was washing in damaged his skin which was already starting to burn, and almost wishing that one of the waves that crashed against him would roll over his head and drag him out to sea.

_The mist had completely lifted by the time they had exited the boss' house with the boy that the missing-nin had been hired to retrieve. He had found the boy in an upstairs room when he had been helping clear the house while Naruto had been occupied with the lock to the boss' hidden escape tunnel, which could come out anywhere since they hadn't found the other end during their run through the compound. Without the mist to obscure them, the bodies practically stood out in the light of the three-quarter moon._

_The sight of the bodies brought back memories that he had spent the last four years either trying to forget or to remember in greater detail as incentive to drive him further depending on what he was doing at the time. The thing was, this time, he had helped do it._

_He had helped do it, and though he was mostly sickened and horrified by what he'd done, a small part of him had liked it..._

Throughout the trip back, he couldn't get over the stench that came from the blood that had clung to his skin and clothing the way it had four years ago when he had run from body to body hoping and praying that one of his aunts, uncles, or cousins who had been strewn about the compound like garbage was alive. The instant they had reached their destination, he had run into the water, not caring about the risk of undertow dragging him from shore, and started scrubbing the blood off.

As he scrubbed, he wondered if he had gotten lost somewhere. He had to have to have even considered enjoying the killing he had done the way that He had enjoyed killing the clan. The person he had been before IT had happened would have been absolutely horrified by the thought of killing someone and throwing their body aside like trash, not felt the rising sense of satisfaction at a job well done that began to eat away at the horror he had felt.

* * *

As Kakashi replaced his hitai-ate he felt a sense of relief wash over him. He'd always hated going on the sort of unofficial missions which Konoha may need to disavow, mainly because they were the sort of mission that left you the most messed up afterward. He was worried about Sasuke's mental state. The boy had been exceedingly vicious in battle, and afterward...

Well, the boy had currently been in the water over an hour, and was still scrubbing his skin raw.

Sighing, he got up and waded out to where the boy was scrubbing the skin off his arm with a handful of sand. He grabbed the boy's arm, and forced him to drop the sand before he picked him up and carried him to shore. Shimura, who looked about twice as tired as he felt, was there waiting with a blanket. As soon as the boy was ashore, he and Shimura wrapped the boy in the blanket and carried him back into the cave.

The boy made several choking noises, and he got out of the way in case the kid vomited, as that was a common reaction after such a battle. It was apparent that shock had delayed his reactions so far, and the boy was finally beginning to process what he had done. When the boy failed to vomit, he got close enough to get a good look at the kid's face.

He was crying.

Sighing, he wrapped his arms around the boy and pulled him close, like he had done for a number of his ANBU teammates after similar missions. The boy needed someone to be there for him right now the way Minato-sensei had been there for him the day he'd lost his first two teammates, and the day he'd lost his father, and the day he'd lost Obito. He'd be that person right now. He had to be, since the child's sensei was too mentally and physically exhausted to deal with the situation right now, and was practically dead on his feet at the moment.

Sasuke wasn't nearly as tough as he tried to convince himself as well as everyone else he was. It was a pity that the boy had had to learn that the hard way this evening.

* * *

Itachi frowned slightly when he awoke to find the crow he'd left in Konoha in case the Council needed him for something coming in for a landing. The bird landed by his side as he sat up, and he took the note it had been carrying in its beak. The handwriting was Homura's, which was highly unusual because, every other time he'd been contacted, it had been either by the Hokage or Danzo. Not that he'd been contacted all that often over the last four years.

Curious, he broke the seal.

He almost acted in an uncharacteristic manner when he had read the contents of the note that the crow had brought him. His precious brother who was supposed to be safe in Konoha raking leaves, walking dogs, and training to kill him had been captured by missing-nin on a C-Rank gone wrong. Rather than sending someone out to rescue his brother, the Hokage had decided to sit back and wait for things to play out.

According to the letter, his brother's last known location had been somewhere outside the small border town of Saida, which he'd not heard of before since it was too small and remote to bother marking on a map.

Sighing because he hated violence, and because violence would undoubtedly be necessary in this situation, he got up and headed off towards his brother's last known location. Fortunately, he was in Southern Lightning Country near the border of Frost, so the journey wouldn't be as far as it would have been were he in say, the River Country base for instance.

"What's going on?" Kisame, who had been woken by his departure, asked when he finally caught up to him.

"Nothing." he replied. "Just some personal business I need to take care of."

"Will there be fighting?" Kisame asked almost eagerly.

"Yes." he replied, almost looking forward to the upcoming violence just this once.

"Count me in." Kisame said giving him a razor toothed grin.

"I'd rather not." he replied. He hadn't told Kisame about Sasuke yet, and considering how the other man felt about lies, there was no way of knowing how his partner would react to his lie of omission.

"You don't have a choice." Kisame replied, continuing to follow him.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	26. The Saida Mob

Kakashi smiled as the messenger hawk arrived with the requested funds and an order to return to Konoha for a debriefing. Of course this would cause them to miss the mission to provide babysitting services for a nobleman who was attending a darts tournament, and the controlled burn in a bit of parkland in the North, and throw all of their other missions into question but, after a mission like the last one, they all needed a little downtime, and the kids would need some counseling. Unless it was during wartime and they had no other options, Genin almost never ran missions like this.

So much for the Chunin Exams in January, but, at least they all got out of this alive and in one piece.

He handed the money the hawk had brought to Zabuza, who was the leader of the little group of missing-nins, concluding their business. The danger was past, and all that was left was to go home. They had fulfilled their end of the bargain, and the man had found no reason to complain about their pay or services.

"I hope we never see each-other on the opposite side of the battlefield." Zabuza said before turning back to the cave that served as the group's hide-out.

There was no goodbye but, then again, Ninja didn't often say goodbye as it was bad luck. They'd usually say something along the lines of "See you later" or " 'Til we meet again". As Zabuza had no intention of seeing them again however, that had served as his fare-well. He wouldn't be saying goodbye to the other man either, so it all evened out.

He would not be giving the cave's location to anyone when he reached civilization, despite the fact that giving the information would be pointless. He had little doubt that should he direct anyone to the cave, the group would be long gone by the time anyone he might tip off got there. Zabuza and the rest of his group were already packed and, hours earlier, the Demon Brothers had carried Mai off to parts unknown where she would be accompanied by her husband Renji until she was well enough for them to rejoin their group. The only thing giving the location of the cave would do would betray the trust that their brief companions who had saved Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke had given them, and he had no intention of doing so.

As Zabuza disappeared into the cave, his team started their own disappearing act in a Saidaward direction. Based on Shimura's account of his and Meizu's treatment in Saida, he knew better than to expect a warm welcome from the inhabitants. It was somewhat understandable, considering the deaths of the small children, and the fact that the people of Saida needed someone to blame. Unfortunately, before blame could be turned where it was due, someone had stepped up and pointed the blame squarely at his team.

Konoha would deal with the situation later on but, that wouldn't be helping them now.

* * *

When Itachi and Kisame reached Saida, where their trail supposedly began, it was to find some overweight and far too richly dressed merchant standing in the town square sermonizing on how Ninjas were the source of all the trouble in the world, and that things would only improve if they were all gotten rid of. Kisame looked like he wanted to kill the man sheerly out of principle.

"Leave it Kisame." he said. "We don't have time."

"Don't have time for what?" Kisame, who was still reaching for his sword, asked. "You never told me where we're going."

He didn't reply, choosing instead to follow the first trail out of town he spotted that looked like it had been made by ninjas, and from the looks of things, this particular trail had had frequent ninja traffic on it recently. After following it for a while, he reached a clearing in the woods which contained a few wrecked and run-down buildings and a number of freshly dug graves. He barely restrained himself from racing over to the graves and frantically digging to make sure that Sasuke wasn't in one of them, as that would just serve to further fuel Kisame's suspicions and give something away to Madara should he be watching. Struggling to keep a sedate pace, he moved over to the graves and used an Earth Jutsu that he'd once copied in order to bring the corpses to the surface.

He did his best not to slump in relief when he saw them. None of them were Sasuke.

Since a couple of them were wearing hitai-ate marked with the symbol of the now defunct Yugakure, and another one was wearing a stricken through Frost symbol, he felt that it was safe to assume that these had been the missing-nin who had captured his younger brother. He could now see why the Hokage hadn't sent out assistance. By the time that Homura had received word that Sasuke had been captured, the Hokage must've received word that the situation had already been dealt with.

"It would seem that the fight's already over." he said as he re-buried the corpses.

He would of course be tracking Sasuke down before he and his team arrived in Konoha in order to make sure he was alright. Whether or not he stayed out of sight would depend on his brother's mental state. If the boy seemed broken by his experience, he would do anything it took in order to motivate him to survive and grow stronger. He had to. When he was gone, Madara wouldn't show his brother any mercy otherwise.

A weak Sasuke would very soon be a dead Sasuke, and he couldn't have that.

* * *

Shin sighed as he, his friend who had yet to be named, since the name he'd previously had had been discarded, and the team they'd been following reached Saida where Team Tetsuo would be picking up the rest of their supplies before heading back to Konoha. After running flat out for an entire day and night to get there, he and the little guy had followed Team Tetsuo back from the cave where they and a group of missing-nin from Mist had been holed up after what looked to have been an exceedingly difficult mission.

Both he, and his training partner who would be forced to fight him soon were exhausted, and it was beginning to show.

When they'd arrived back in Saida, Team Tetsuo had received a welcome that was far less warm than the one they deserved, considering the fact that they had done something that had quite likely saved the town in the long run. Any would-be conquering army that came through the Hot Water border would have run through the small town first on their way into Fire Country, and a guy who had been confident enough to try building a hidden village under everyone's noses would be the sort who had the balls to try invading another country if he thought he might get away with it, and the ego to believe that he would get away with it.

As Team Tetsuo left Saida with their packs which, fortunately, the innkeepers hadn't been stupid enough to try destroying out of fear of whatever traps they might contain, the merchant who was so fat that he was surprised the man could even walk decided to gather the townspeople in order to give the team a sending off party with rocks.

That was going just a little too far.

It wouldn't be fair to kill the townspeople who had been duped by the lies of a man who had thought he could get out of paying the ninja by sending a mob after them, but he had to neutralize them somehow...

Coming up with what he thought was a brilliant idea, but one the little guy and Danzo-sama would more than likely consider idiotic, he Shunshined over to the side of the merchant who was at the head of the mob.

"Throw that rock and Danzo-sama will expose your involvement with the underground slave market." Shin said to the fat merchant who was trying to stir up civil unrest in a theatrical whisper that he was certain had carried to over half of the mob which was standing behind them.

The merchant dropped his rock in surprise, indicting himself in the eyes of the listening public. Whether or not the man was actually involved in the underground slave market, he had just destroyed his credibility in the eyes of the Saida townspeople. The villagers who stood immediately behind the merchant looked at him in disgust and, from the looks of it, were prepared to throw their rocks at the merchant rather than the departing ninja.

As he vanished and reappeared by his training partner's side, a whisper started going up through the crowd. Apparently, a number of the townspeople had been involved in the burial of a group that had been associated with the group that Team Tetsuo had assisted the missing-nin from Kiri in taking out. The merchant had claimed that the Konoha nin had been in on it with that group, and had turned around and betrayed them when they felt it was convenient to do so. But, with the allegedly slave trading merchant's word in question, people were beginning to wonder what really happened, especially considering the fact that someone had remembered seeing one of the ninja children being kidnapped as they lost consciousness.

There were also grumbles from a group of stallkeepers and cider manufacturers who had apparently either been stiffed by the merchant, or had been given raw deals by him. It was amazing how much rich people felt compelled to steal despite the fact that they had more than just about everyone else. The sad thing was that people who would chase a poor man who stole a crust of bread to the ends of the earth tended to let them.

The mob began to disperse and head back to their homes, save for a few who looked very much like they wanted to chase the merchant who had turned them against the ninja who had avenged the deaths of a number of their children out of town.

_And that Pipsqueak, is how you correctly neutralize a threat with words_. he signed to his pale partner whose dark hair and dark eyes made him look even paler than he actually was.

_You wanna help me plant the evidence proving that that asshole who tried getting away with stiffing ninjas and turning a town against us is involved in a bunch of illegal shit? _he signed as they walked off.

_Gladly. _the little guy signed back.

Rather than follow Team Tetsuo out of the village and down the road to Konoha like the probably should have been doing, they went to the rooms that the fatass merchant had rented and had a look around. The little guy, who was the best artist he had ever seen, didn't have to forge too many papers. The lardass had his finger in several pies, a few of which were illegal, and hadn't bothered trying to hide the evidence of his dirty dealings all that much, confident that since nobody had gone looking for it before now, they wouldn't go looking in the future.

Now, to find a way to get the good townspeople of Saida to find all this wonderful evidence before the merchant left...

**Edited 10-6-12**


	27. Truth and Lies

Yamanaka Inoichi sighed as he filled out the paperwork that was sitting on his desk, while he waited for, but didn't particularly anticipate. what was to come in a few short hours because, at some point today or perhaps early tomorrow, he would be dealing with Naruto, which was never fun. Dealing with Naruto was like a highwire act at the best of times, and right now wasn't the best of times since, by all accounts, Naruto had been on a mission that would give even seasoned Jounin issues.

When he'd first encountered the boy earlier this year after that debacle in Kiri, the child had had the most precarious mental balance of anyone he'd encountered who wasn't stark raving mad. Since then, he'd been working on carefully integrating the darker parts of the boy's psyche before they jumped out of hiding and took him over in the middle of a mission or something. If Naruto had gotten to him any later than he had, it was entirely possible that all of those things that the boy had been trying to repress would have broken off and formed an entirely new personality. As it was, it had been a close thing, and integrating the repressed memories and emotions without driving the boy over the edge of madness was long, hard, and delicate work. This last mission could have undone a great deal of the progress he'd made with the boy over the last several months.

The fact that he constantly had to watch over his shoulder because the Kyuubi was capable of appearing in the boy's mindscape didn't help matters at all.

After he dealt with Naruto today, he would be dealing with the boy's teammates, Uchiha Sasuke, the boy Ino had a crush on, and Haruno Sakura, Ino's little friend whom she'd been feuding with over said crush for the last year or so. He wasn't looking forward to seeing them either. Especially since he'd be mentally exhausted from dealing with Naruto when he did and, by all accounts, both of them had serious issues that needed to be worked through, issues that had not been helped by the mission they hadn't been ready for, but had been forced to undertake nonetheless.

Today was most definitely not going to be a good day. And, if Team Tetsuo didn't return by this evening, tomorrow wouldn't be either.

* * *

"So, are we going to ambush them?" Kisame asked from where he was hidden in a tree, watching the trail that led to Konoha.

"No Kisame." Itachi replied, carefully studying the group that was traveling along the path he and his teammate were hidden alongside.

Sasuke looked to be in bad shape based on the way he was leaning in close to Kakashi-sempai for comfort the way a number of his teammates had after a difficult mission, but he didn't look to be broken yet. At this point, the motivation he had been considering giving his little brother if he thought he needed it would break him rather than build him back up, which was something neither of them needed. Based on the tensing of Kakashi-sempai's and the other Jounin's shoulders, and the way Naruto was sniffing the air like a dog or some other wild animal, they could sense that someone was there, and it was making them nervous. Seeing as his presence could be detrimental at the moment, and nothing would be gained from a fight, he decided that it was time to leave.

The time he had spent heading out to rescue Sasuke who had proven not to need a rescue since his team had it handled hadn't entirely been wasted though. By seeing Sasuke and his teammates, he had gotten a reminder of exactly what he was fighting for. He was fighting for his brother, who should have been seeking comfort in his presence rather than Kakashi-sempai's, he was fighting for little Naruto, who had grown up to become a warrior, and he was fighting for all of his other comrades like the pink haired girl and the other Jounin, and most of all, he was fighting for the villagers of Konoha which was a ways up the road.

"Let's go Kisame." he said to his partner who looked to be gearing up for a fight. A fight that he'd be forced to interfere with and win for his brother's sake if it came down to it.

* * *

"So, what was that about?" Kisame asked as he followed his partner, who he had begun to think of as a friend, away from what looked like it would have been a fun fight, giving him one chance to tell him the truth, or their quasi-friendship was over.

He hated it when people lied to him, and it looked as if that had been what Itachi had done. On the way through Fire Country, when they'd stopped to eat, he had heard some rather interesting rumors. Rumors of a fight that turned into a massacre that had supposedly involved a Uchiha. A Uchiha who wasn't Itachi, despite the fact that Itachi had supposedly slaughtered his entire clan. He had joined the Akatsuki to get away from the lies, and help create the world without lies that Madara had envisioned. He wouldn't have a partner who lied to him while he was here.

"It would seem that my little brother didn't need my help after all." Itachi replied in that flat, emotionless tone of voice that gave him the creeps.

"Excuse me," he said, wondering if he heard the teenager right "But, your little what? !"

"My younger brother Sasuke." Itachi replied tonelessly as if he were discussing the price of dango in Tea Country, not the fact that the Uchiha clan wasn't as extinct as he'd been led to believe, and that Itachi had left at least a little brother behind.

"I thought you killed your entire clan aside from Madara." he said, wondering why he hadn't heard of this Sasuke kid before, especially considering how closely related to Itachi he was. "Are there any other Uchiha running around that I should know about?"

"Considering clan policy on bastards, I think it would be safe to say that the answer is no." Itachi replied as he made his way in the direction of the job they had been heading towards when Itachi had gone running back to Fire Country, apparently out of concern for his little brother, whom he'd spared when he'd slaughtered the rest of the clan including his own parents for some strange reason.

He would be having a long talk with his partner. They had all the time they needed, since Itachi had more than doubled their journey to Kumo, and there was nothing else for them to do on the way.

* * *

The Saida town Headman Ikari Denmaru scowled as he sorted through the papers that had been found in the merchant's rooms by the innkeeper who had brought the man's exceedingly spoiled children back to his rooms because they had been causing mischief. Amongst the man's contacts was the name of an infamous slave trader who was wanted in at least seven countries, and amongst the contracts the man had filed away was a tentative agreement for a possible B Ranked mission to rescue the man's two brats that had been dated the morning after the kidnapping, which had been signed by one of the Konoha ninja who had been acting as a representative of Konoha.

It had been as the ninja who had brought the man's children home had said. The merchant had used them all to stiff the ninja, not caring about the potential consequences to the town should the ninja choose to object to the treatment they had received. Based on the stories that were coming out of the southern part of Hot Water Country, the ninja could have killed them all without even breaking a sweat had they so chosen. Instead, they had risked their lives to rescue the merchant's children. And, how did the man repay them? With cruelty and rocks.

Most shamefully of all, they had helped him.

They would have to be more careful who they let into their town in the future. It was bad enough that several of their children had died because a criminal organization had decided to kidnap a bunch of Genin and a wealthy merchant's children for ransom. Having said merchant exploit the deaths of their children in order to stiff the ninja who had rescued his children as well as their Genin was worse, much, much, worse. The next time they held this festival, they would be more careful when they vetted the merchants they invited since inviting the wealthiest merchants they could think of hadn't worked out so well. The super-wealthy merchant that they had thought would bring in a great deal of money and bankroll future festivals had turned out to be thieving, slaving, criminal scum.

Coming to a decision, he wrote a letter, and handed it to his fastest runner to carry to the Capitol. Until the man returned with the Fire Lord's decision, the merchant would be held in the village on charges of theft, public disturbance, and inciting a riot, and his new quarters would be nowhere near as nice as this inn was.

* * *

Futoru Kinmaru smirked as he saw the mob heading towards him. The stupid back-country bastards who had failed to deal with the ninja as he'd hoped may think they had the upper hand now but, in the end it would be them who would be paying, and paying dearly. He may not have been say Gato for instance but, he had more thugs in his employ than this town had residents, and could hire as many as he wanted to with all of the money he had. These people would regret turning on him.

If they'd done what they were supposed to and followed his lead, he would have just bought up their town. Now however, now he was going to have to make an example of them, an example that would make people too afraid to oppose him as word of what he was going to do here spread.

"If you run me out of town, I'll just come back, and you won't want me to come back. There won't be a town left when I do." he said confidently.

"Run you out?" the man at the head of the mob said incredulously. "Why would we do something like that when we're here to arrest you?"

His smirk slipped slightly. This wasn't how these things went. It didn't matter though, his men would come to free him, and the example he made of them would be that much worse.

* * *

Renji smiled when the prognosis the doctor gave him was good. Mai would live. She would probably have a bit of a limp for the rest of her life, but she would live. He wouldn't have been able to live without his wife had she died. He and Mai had lived near each-other all their lives, played together every day as children, and had gone to the Academy together in those infamous days before Zabuza had forced reform by killing his entire graduating class to prove he had what it took to be a ninja. It had been Mai who had saved his life during their graduation exam.

Unitl Mai recovered, they would be staying here in Yugakure. The hot springs that surrounded the village could only help with Mai's recovery, and this would be his and Mai's chance to take the honeymoon they'd never gotten because they had been too busy working, and then they'd been on the run after Zabuza had failed to kill the Mizukage who was being controlled by somebody who remained hidden in the shadows. Of course, the irony of the fact that a pair of missing-nin were staying in a former ninja village wasn't lost on him.

As soon as Mai was a bit better, this trip could prove to be a great deal of fun. Fortunately, Zabuza had left them with a little money, taking away that worry at least.

As he smiled down at Mai, who was the love of his life and always had been, she opened her eyes and smiled back up at him despite the pain she was still in. They were near complete opposites, with her being bloodthirsty and he a near pacifist, but he loved her anyway, and wouldn't trade her for the world.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	28. Evaluation and Examination

The Sandaime Hokage sat at his desk reading the report he'd received ahead of Team Tetsuo's arrival that morning. According to Kakashi, the Genin had handled themselves rather professionally despite the fact that they had been on a mission that was well above their pay grade, a mission that was more difficult than the Chunin Exams generally were. He would of course await the results of the team's debriefing before he made a final decision, but he felt it safe to consider giving the team a couple of in-village D Ranks to make up for the missions they were missing. He didn't expect Uchiha Sasuke and Haruno Sakura to become Chunin their first time out, but based on what he'd read, it looked like they would be able to handle the Exams at the very least. Add in the fact that the two would be two months out of the Academy at that point, and Konoha's stock would go up.

Hopefully, Inoichi's report would be favorable. If it wasn't however, he would have to scrap his and the younger Shimura's plan despite the boost it would have given Konoha's reputation. He wasn't willing to secure that rise in reputation at the expense of a pair of exceedingly promising young Genin who looked to have stellar careers ahead of them. Good ninja were exceedingly valuable, and great ones were worth far more than what could turn out to look like a cheap gimmick if the Haruno and the Uchiha didn't do as well as expected and brought the team down. There was a risk of that happening, considering what the Shimura boy had written of the Haruno girl who had finally started to make some gains in her abilities.

"What are you thinking about old friend?" Homura asked as he and Koharu entered his office uninvited, like they often did when they were bored and had nothing else to do.

"January." he replied as he read the number of Uchiha Sasuke's confirmed kills. The boy wasn't on his brother's level, but ninja like Itachi showed up maybe once a generation at best. Sasuke, who had been named in honor of his father, showed a great deal of promise though. Given a bit of time, and the right training, he could be one of Konoha's top shinobi.

"You can't still be considering..." Koharu started, looking shocked that he would even think such a thing, especially considering what had just happened to the team in question.

"Let's see how they handle their next few missions, and then we'll see." he replied as he read about Naruto's heretofore unknown talent with Seals which would have to be carefully evaluated and directed by a proper teacher, such as Jiraiya, who would be returning for the boy in several months.

"So, what did you come in here for this time?" he asked as he continued to read, noting that the team had passed up on a potential recruit with no actual ties to Kirigakure that the Medical Corps would have been drooling over if the account he was reading was accurate.

"Well, um..." Homura started.

"You were bored." he finished, knowing that that was the case since his teammates had popped by to bother him when they couldn't think of anything else to do more times than he could count over the years.

Koharu and Homura both had the decency to look vaguely guilty. Most people wouldn't have seen it, but he had known them since they were small children, and knew the meaning of every slight shift in their posture, much the way he did with Danzo, whom he had known since he was a toddler.

"I do believe that there were a few more D Ranks than Genin teams ready to take them today thanks to the retraining program." he said with a smile, before deciding to play matchmaker for Homura, since the widow Tanaka, whom Homura had had a crush on back when they were children, had asked for a team to go to the market and fetch her some groceries.

* * *

Yamanaka Inoichi frowned as he wrote up the reports on Shimura Tetsuo's students for the Hokage. In his opinion, the team, as it was, would most definitely not be prepared for the Chunin Exams in January despite the fact that the Hokage wanted them to be. He wasn't sure that he'd recommend them for the Exams that were coming up in July next year either.

Things could be considered to be very bad when the Jinchuriki was the most well adjusted of the three. One reason for this had been because Morishita Kinako, who had been falling into addiction since the deaths of two of her students, had taken it upon herself to provide Naruto with some extra counseling alongside what he was providing the boy so Naruto would never again flip out the way he had in Kiri. Another reason for this had been because Uchiha Sasuke was an emotional wreck who had been "excused" from his visits to the Academy counselor by one Assistant Instructor Mizuki who had supposedly been providing the boy with individualized Taijutsu instruction that could only take place during the time period that had been allotted by Sasuke's counselor more than two years ago, and any real progress that had been made had been lost since then. Yet another reason for this was that Sakura, who had seemed so normal on the surface, had created an alternate personality to think and voice any "Socially Inappropriate" thoughts for her so she could remain "Polite, Demure, and Ladylike", as he mother constantly urged her to be.

He felt sorry for Sakura's father. The few times he'd met the man, his impression of him had been "henpecked". It was obvious to him, and the rest of the village that Haruno Kita's main failing was that he was too weak willed to stand up to his wife. As a result of his failure to keep his wife in check, his life had nearly been completely destroyed. The man had lost a job that he had held for fifteen years, had only found another one through sheer dumb luck, and he might end up losing that one as well if the story of the true extent of the damage his wife had caused to his daughter was ever made known.

He felt even sorrier for Sakura. The poor girl had been torn between two worlds for years and, to make matters worse, she'd recently had her illusions about one of them stripped away from her. Learning that the ninja world was nowhere near as romantic as she'd been led to believe had been very traumatic for the girl, and he was afraid that if things weren't taken into hand soon, a third personality might break off, causing incalculable damage to the girl's psyche.

Uchiha Sasuke, on whom his daughter had unfortunately had a crush for years, was on the verge of a total breakdown. All it would take would be a push in the right spot, and the kid would snap like dry kindling and, considering the boy's usual attitude which pushes everyone away, nobody would notice until it was far too late. Fortunately, based on the boy's reaction to his last mission, it didn't look like he would go on a killing spree like his brother had when he broke. Unfortunately however, it looked like he'd be likely to commit suicide, most probably suicide by brother. The boy had spent almost every day of the last four years training himself to kill his brother to the exclusion of all else. Based on his scores though, he was nowhere near Uchiha Itachi's projected level of skill.

All in all, the only member of the team who was even close to being mentally prepared for the Chunin Exams and life as a Chunin afterward at this point was Naruto who hadn't regressed nearly as much as he had feared he would. One thing he would never recommend doing with the boy however was placing him in ANBU. Taking on missions like the one he had just run on a semi-regular basis would be very bad for the boy's mental health.

* * *

Sakura had been on her way home from the session she'd had with Ino's father when she had a rather strange encounter. Hyuuga Hinata, whom she hadn't spoken more than ten words to at the Academy, had invited her to stay at her home. Wondering why the painfully shy girl had invited her to a sleepover considering the fact that they had never really been friends, she had asked her as much. Much to her surprise, the girl subsequently informed her that she hadn't invited her for a sleepover, she had invited her to stay. Smiling at the strange girl so as not to upset her, she told her she would consider her generous offer, and got the heck out of there as quickly as she could.

She didn't know what was wrong with Hinata, and she didn't want to know.

That had turned out to be the first of a number of strange encounters she ended up having on the way home. The next one had occurred as she was as she was making her way through the marketplace, having decided to stop to get some anmitsu on the way home in order to calm her nerves after the rather bizarre encounter with Hinata, While she was at the stand that sold some of the best anmitsu in Konoha, an old woman, whom she'd never seen before, had walked up to her, critically looked her up and down, and pulled the front of her dress forward at the waist.

"Too skinny." the woman had said with a scowl before walking off.

On the way home from the market, she had been stopped by a number of ninja who had asked her if she was okay, further disturbing her, as all of the ninja who had stopped her had been strangers. Two more of her former classmates, these two being rivals for Sasuke's affection, and girls who had cruelly teased her for years, had stopped her and offered to let her stay at their homes as well. The weird thing about it was that they actually seemed to be sincere in their offers.

By the time she got home, she was almost afraid of what she might, or worse, might not find when she went inside. Fortunately, things weren't as bad as she feared they would be and, much to her relief, her mother was there to greet her at the door.

She had been relieved to see her mother for all of the five minutes it had taken for her day to go completely to hell. It would seem that her mother hadn't dropped out of her Extreme Mode in the three weeks that she'd been gone, and that the woman had said or done something that had caused the entire village to be concerned for her welfare. Considering the fact that her mother soon started acting like she'd completely lost it, she could see why even people who had previously disliked her were inviting her to live with them.

She had barely gotten in the door before her crying mother, who'd been both shocked and happy to see her, had started sobbing over the loss of her pretty hair, the nicks, blisters and callouses on her hands, the scraped knee, and the scratches on her arms and legs. After crying for a good fifteen minutes, her mother had ordered her to put her shoes back on. Confused, she complied only to be herded her down to the local civilian clinic that she'd been going to since she was a baby. At the clinic, she became beyond mortified as her mother embarrassed her in front of everyone in the waiting room by loudly demanding the doctor come out immediately and give her a full examination and check for sexual abuse.

To her utter humiliation, she was forced to sit in the waiting room for an hour and a half until one of the doctors had time to see a walk-in because, she knew that if she ran, her mother would just kick up a fuss until she cooperated. As she sat there in the toy filled waiting room of the pediatric clinic, she could feel the eyes of all of the other patients and their parents, some of whom were neighbors whom she had known since she was a baby, on her. Eventually, one of the three doctors who ran the clinic had a free slot due to a cancellation, and her mother followed her into the examination room where the doctor had asked her a number of awkward questions that she didn't want to be asked, much less answer in front of her mother. To make matters worse, her mother ended up creating a commotion when she'd refused to strip in order to be "fully examined" by the doctor.

She didn't need to be looked at there. Contrary to what her mother seemed to think, none of her teammates had even considered using her in that manner. She told her mother as much before she stormed off fully aware of the eyes that were following her as she left the building.

Hinata's invitation was starting to look better and better by the minute.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	29. Apartment Hunting

Haruno Kita was tense as he headed home. The first hint he'd been given that his wife had broken her promise to stop embarrassing the family by making baseless accusations in an attempt to drive Sakura's sensei's family out of town the way she'd driven that foreign family out a couple years back had been when his new boss had come up to him, told him that he didn't blame him, and that he still had a job since he was a good worker and what was going on wasn't really his fault.

His wife's current attempts at trying to drive another family out of Konoha hadn't gone so well for their own family. Sakura's sensei was related to a scary and powerful man who could crush his family like a bug if he so chose, and everyone knew it. Because everyone knew it, they did their best to avoid supporting them lest they find themselves guilty of challenging Danzo by association. Add the fact that many ninja were upset that they hadn't been taking care of their daughter correctly, and their family, he and his wife at least, were pretty much personae non gratae in Konoha.

On the way home, he had received a number of looks of pity and/or concern that confirmed the fact that his wife had been unable to keep her promise for even a week. To add to his confusion, the old doctor he'd known since he was a child, and had been bringing his daughter to, had walked up to him and asked him to schedule an appointment for his daughter since the girl had walked out on an examination when he'd run into him while he was on his way home from the clinic. As it had been for the last few weeks, the whispers that had steadily begun to turn harsh continued to follow him as he passed.

"Dear," he said as soon as he got into the door to find his red-eyed wife who'd obviously been crying earlier waiting for him. "I thought that you had promised to quit trying to antagonize the Shimura family."

"I did." his wife wailed, "But, you didn't see Sakura when she returned. It was obvious that they were mistreating her, and they made her too afraid to say anything other than what they wanted her to say. You should have seen her! She ran out of the clinic in fear!"

"Where is she now?" he asked, concerned about his daughter, and praying that things weren't anywhere near as bad as his wife had been portraying them.

"I don't know. She left a note saying that she was moving out!" his wife wailed.

* * *

Sakura sighed as she made her way to the first place on the short list she had made the day she'd passed the graduation exam when she'd been flush with excitement over her newfound state of adulthood and considered taking it one step further. She'd almost thrown the list out the next day when she'd realized how expensive the prospect was, and that she wouldn't have anyone there to fix her meals for her, to tuck her in at night, and to tend to her when she was sad, lonely, or ill. Now, despite the fact that she had a feeling that she was being a bit rash, she was a bit glad she hadn't thrown the list out.

If Naruto and Sasuke could live on their own without any parents telling them what to do or, worse, completely embarrassing them in front of the entire village, then she could too. She'd miss her mom's cooking, and seeing her dad at dinner and sometimes breakfast, but that was a natural consequence of living on her own.

Normally, her mother wasn't anywhere near as bad as this, and she was a good mother who had made sure she had everything she needed, comforted her when she was down, and had dinner on the table for if she wanted it. But lately, her mother had gone into Extreme Mode. Her mother rarely if ever went into Extreme Mode, unless someone either very seriously upset her like that one woman who had constantly been bitchy towards her and eventually knocked her into the mud in the marketplace had been, or unless something that was precious to her was threatened in some way. When her mother was in Extreme Mode, you'd better hope you weren't her target because she would do anything it took to destroy you.

She pulled herself out of her musing, and focused on the large building in front of her that had once been a roadside inn back before the founding of Konoha which provided reputable Genin housing from what she'd heard. From the outside, it looked to be reasonably well kept for a centuries old building that had been inhabited almost solely by teenagers and young adults who'd been specially trained to destroy things for the last fifty years. There were a number of older teenagers hanging around on the porch, and it was quite obvious that they were ninja despite the fact that they were dressed in off-duty attire. They were too alert, and there were far too many weapons evident for them to be anything else.

After passing the rather intimidating group that was hanging out on the porch, who'd stared at her the entire time, she almost timidly made her way to the main office, cowed by the stares and the whispers which had followed her along the way. Apparently, word of her mother's behavior at the clinic had already gotten around. She ended up leaving the office, and the building altogether, five minutes later, after the manager of the building that was more like a boarding house than an apartment complex had apologetically informed her that there were no openings, and that the waitlist was a year long.

After that, she started making her way down the list of places that had rooms and apartments for rent at rates which appeared to be reasonable for someone living on a Genin income. As she did so, it quickly became apparent why most of those places were so reasonably priced. The cats that belonged to the old woman on Life street were absolutely vicious, and living in the same building as them would be taking her life into her own hands. Other people who were renting out rooms in their homes expected her to do the equivalent of several D-ranked missions for free while she lived there, and the apartment complexes turned out to be located in the parts of town where it was recommended that you have several weapons on hand before approaching.

Finally, as darkness fell, when she was about to give up hope, she made her way to the last building on the list. The building was a bit old and run down, but it wasn't too bad, and the neighborhood it was in wasn't in the worst part of town either. Honestly, after the other places she'd seen, she was confused and somewhat wary as to why the rent there was so low. Despite the late hour, the manager, who seemed to be a nice enough person, had shown her around a reasonably sized if somewhat elderly apartment that she could actually see herself living in.

Almost afraid that there had been a misprint in the advertisement that had caused her to put the place on the list, she had asked the manager what the rent was. The advertisement had been completely accurate. Half fearing that she'd find asbestos in the walls or something, she signed the lease despite the fact that her instincts were telling her that the manager was trying to hide something from her. So far, aside from home, which she would need to move away from one day anyway, this place had been the best option available.

After entering her new apartment to set down the bag of belongings she'd hurriedly packed before leaving, she turned around to head to her former home in order to pick up the rest of her stuff. On the way out of the building, she had almost run into Naruto who had been coming up the stairs.

"Hey Sakura, what are you doing here?" Naruto asked.

"I live here." she replied, wondering what Naruto was doing here, and if he'd been stalking her for some reason.

"That's funny, so do I." Naruto said.

* * *

Haruno Kita perked up slightly when he'd heard the front door open. He had been waiting all evening for his daughter to return, and half fearing that she wouldn't since there were any number of places she could have gone to stay until she found a new place to live. The fact that she'd come home instead seemed to be a good sign.

"Hi dad, I've missed you." Sakura said as she gave him a hug when he went to the door to greet her.

He quietly studied his daughter, searching for signs of the horrendous abuse she'd supposedly gone through, and the terror that his wife had spoke of. She didn't look any more badly banged up than a number of his ninja acquaintances had after intense training, and she didn't look particularly fearful or as if she were trying to hide anything from him. A few of the scratches he saw on her arms and legs reminded him of how a childhood friend of his who'd gone through the Academy had looked after he'd learned how to jump through trees but, before he'd learned how to avoid twigs and small branches. About the most shocking change to her appearance was the fact that her hair had been cut short but, many Kunoichi did that after Academy graduation when they got into the field where long hair would get snagged on branches and such unless it was properly pinned back. They usually ended up growing it back later if at all.

"I've missed you too sweetheart." he said when he finished looking his daughter over, and finding much to his relief that it appeared that his wife had been exaggerating.

"What's this I hear about you moving out?" he asked his daughter.

"I'm sorry," Sakura said sadly. "Mom completely humiliated me at the clinic, and in front of the doctor, and I ran off to go look for an apartment so I wouldn't have to deal with her. I have to move now since I already signed the lease."

"You don't seem to be all that happy about moving." he said, knowing that Sakura's sudden decision had become problematic. He couldn't get his child out of the lease agreement because she was an adult under Konoha law and, because of that, Sakura would have to pay for the apartment for however long the lease was for, even if she didn't move in.

"I don't want to leave you and mom behind no matter how annoying she's being right now, and Naruto lives in the building." Sakura replied.

Oh dear. Barako hadn't entirely been imagining things. Considering the fact that Sakura actually seemed to be afraid to live in the same building as Naruto, it was clear that something had really happened while his daughter was away.

"Why don't you want to live in the same building as your teammate dear?" he asked carefully, watching her to see if she would try to hide anything from him, afraid of what the demon in a child's skin could have done to his daughter while she had gone somewhere where he couldn't keep her safe.

"He was nice to me during the trip and all, but I know for a fact that he's dangerous." Sakura replied.

"What makes you think he's dangerous?" he asked, almost afraid to learn that his wife may have broken a law that she shouldn't have.

"I tried to hit him once, and he threatened to break my arm." Sakura said. "When mom took me to file a complaint against him, the guy at the complaints desk told me about how he had ripped apart a Genin team from Iwa with his bare hands."

He felt slightly faint as he tried to process his daughter's statement, and exactly what his daughter had gotten into in becoming a ninja. He'd known that ninja were different, but that statement clearly illustrated the difference. A normal, law abiding civilian from Konoha at least would have found the ideas of killings such as that horrific. For a shinobi, such killing was apparently considered admirable, considering how opinion of the demon had shifted amongst the shinobi ranks in recent times.

"At least they were from Iwa." he finally said, as he vaguely patted his daughter on the head before going to sit down, feeling slightly faint as he fully realized that his daughter's life would now be following a blood soaked path.

* * *

**Omake: Sakura's First Try Parents meet Sakura's Anime Parents**

"An accountant huh?" Haruno Kizashi said as he studied the other man whose hair had been slicked down and back rather than combed up in his famous Cherry Blossom design.

"You try being babysat by Danzo when you're a little kid and see if you still want to be a ninja afterward." Haruno Kita replied.

"Yeah, I could see how that could happen. Danzo's given me the creeps since day one." Kizashi replied.

"Our Danzo eats people." Kita said in a manner that almost seemed as if he was trying to one-up him.

"Really?" Kizashi asked, slightly disturbed by the turn the conversation had taken.

Despite the fact that he looked normal on the surface, there was obviously something wrong with his more Kizashi studied the man who was mentally disturbed on some level at the very least, the more inclined he was to believe that the man was more a sibling or a cousin than a straight counterpart.

He'd run into a number of Harunos who had fathered children identical in name and appearance to his daughter who'd had different ancestors than he did on his and his wife's brief tour of the multiverse. Amazingly, just as often as there were worlds where he had married his dear Meibuki, and they had Sakura, there were worlds where their Sakura was born to people who had nothing in common with them aside from the Haruno family name, and a few common ancestors in the distant past. One of the more memorable Haruno couples that particularly stood out in his mind had been the fellow who had looked a great deal like a white haired cat turned human who had been married to what he could have sworn was an Uzumaki.

"And you are...?" Haruno Meibuki asked the woman who was standing next to Haruno Kita, though it was clear that she recognized her.

"Haruno Barako." Kita's wife replied, putting a special emphasis on the Haruno, clearly recognizing the other woman as well.

Apparently, this was yet another universe where Barako and Meibuki both existed and were both rivals. There had been any number of universes where one or the other hadn't existed, just as there had been any number of universes where Sakura's mother had been named Barako but hadn't been that Barako. Meeting the pink-haired half Uzumaki Barako who had been born in that Barako's stead had been quite the experience, especially since it had been his counterpart who'd been the blond instead of his wife's.

"Nice to meet you." Meibuki replied in a falsely sweet tone.

"Likewise." Barako replied in a tone that was just as saccharine.

The rest of the visit was somewhat tense thanks to Barako and Meibuki's somewhat catty behavior. Based on the look that poor disturbed Kita fellow was giving Meibuki, the man seemed to have regretted marrying Barako instead. He knew that he would have regretted marrying Barako if he'd married her himself. The woman was a shrew, and poor Mr. Takeda down the street was the most henpecked man he knew. How a woman like that could create a child that bore any resemblance to his precious Sakura, he didn't know.

"I can't believe that there's a world where you married **her**." Mebuki said to her husband when they returned to their own world where their Sakura was waiting.

"That poor Kita fellow isn't exactly me dear, so it's safe to say that there isn't a world where _I _married that woman." Kizashi replied.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	30. A Lesson in Humility

The Hokage sighed as he read Inoichi's report. It would seem that his plans regarding the Chunin Exams would have to be scrapped. That left one minor issue though, and that was the missions that had been assigned to Team Tetsuo in preparation for the Exams. Because they'd been pulled off the regular schedule, they had been forced to scrabble to find last-minute replacements for the two missions that the team had been forced to cancel in order to return to Konoha, and there were issues with the remaining ones, such as the fact that he would have to completely re-work the entire border patrol schedule if the team didn't take that one.

Despite the fact that Shimura Tetsuo's students wouldn't be attending the Chunin Exams in Suna, it would appear that they would still have to complete the missions that had been assigned to them in preparation for those Exams, as the alternative would end up being a nightmare of paperwork for him as he was forced to stamp the forms rescinding the missions and re-file them in the general mission pool, which meant running through that paperwork again as well. Due to the young Genin's mental states, he'd almost been tempted to go that route. The reason he hadn't done so though was because of the fact that the re-training of the recent Genin and Academy failures, and the revamping of the Academy Curriculum had generated a great deal of work that he was already way behind on.

As he signed the forms that would send Team Tetsuo to their fate, whatever it may be, he hoped that he wasn't making a mistake sending them back out there so soon after such an incredibly traumatic mission, especially considering the number of things that could go wrong during even a routine caravan escort, border patrol, or bandit clearing mission.

On the other hand however, despite the number of things that could go wrong on those three basic C-Ranked missions, they were usually uneventful, which was why it had long ago been deemed safe enough to send Genin on them so long as there was a Jounin to supervise things and make sure the kids weren't slacking off. Team Tetsuo had two Jounin at this point, though Kakashi would be departing at the end of December when the final mission he'd signed up to take in conjunction with the team ended.

Both Sasuke and Sakura were in serious need of counseling, the sooner the better, but, a few easy and routine C-Ranks that had better chances of them dying of boredom than anything else shouldn't break them before they received said counseling. Considering the fact that the team had just had a mission go south on them in a way that was pretty much one-in-a-million, the odds against something like that happening again any time soon were good.

So, while he was afraid of what could go wrong, odds were that not much would go wrong, and Team Tetsuo would come home safe.

* * *

Naruto sighed when he received the summons from the Council. The Hokage's Council of Advisors wasn't exactly a governmental body but, they held a great deal of authority and power in the village, and not showing up when summoned by them was asking for trouble, especially since the Old Man usually sided with their decisions. Of the three, the one he had heard the most about and had run into most often was Shimura Danzo who was Tetsuo-sensei's grandfather. The two of them had something of an antagonistic relationship, and would often hurl thinly veiled barbs at each-other every time they encountered each-other.

The meeting with the council, in which he, Sasuke, and Sakura had been present, had been tedious and annoying, and he had been exceedingly relieved when they had finally been released. They still had to pack for the missions they'd found out only hours earlier were back on after all, and the meeting had cut sharply into his prep time, especially since he'd unpacked his entire apartment last night and would be forced to pack it again since Suzume and Kurosaki were out of the village, which meant that he'd have to ask Satoshi to watch his plants again. Hopefully Sakura, who had moved into his building that morning while her timid father had attempted to lecture him on something or other, had learned her lesson this time. If she hadn't, he wasn't loaning her any more clothes.

"Don't Sasuke, just don't." Naruto said when he saw the look in his teammate's eyes as they exited the meeting with the Council which had had something to do with his, Sasuke's and Sakura's mental evaluations.

Throughout the meeting, the Old Man's friends had asked a bunch of inane questions that covered the same ground over and over, either intent on getting the right answer so they could pressure the Hokage into changing his decision in regards to the Exams, or intent on tripping them up and finding a reason to agree with the Hokage that sending them to Suna was a bad idea. They'd eventually found the reason that proved to them that the Hokage's decision had been justified in this instance and, because of that, the team would be forced to wait until July at the very least before they could take the Chunin Exams.

"Why not? They're just a bunch of old..." Sasuke started, apparently having been looking forward to going to Suna so he could test his skills against those of ninja from other countries.

"Don't finish that." he said, hurriedly cutting Sasuke off when he'd seen the look that Danzo had given his teammate.

Tetsuo-sensei had once explained to him exactly how dangerous the Council were, especially Danzo, and he'd taken the lesson to heart. One didn't survive sixty years in a field where the average life expectancy was ten, maybe fifteen years of service at best by being incompetent. The reason that the Old Man was Hokage instead of his former teammates or Danzo was because he was just that much more awesome than his advisors. The fact that the Yondaime had been even more powerful than the Old Man just went to show just how incredibly awesome the Yondaime had been, and why everyone who wasn't from Konoha had rightly feared him.

Sasuke gave him that _look, _which was a habit that Tetsuo-sensei and Kakashi had tried in vain to break him of. There was only one thing for it. He would have to let Sasuke learn the hard way, which meant pitting Sasuke up aganst one of the "old farts" so he could see exactly where he stood in comparison. He was almost tempted to see how Sasuke would fare against Danzo, but he didn't want to see what would happen to his teammate if he needlessly antagonized the old man during their fight. Unlike Koharu and Homura, Danzo could and would disappear you like you'd never even existed. With that in mind, he instead chose someone who was just about as tough as the old man, and slightly more forgiving.

"Utatane-sama," he called out, causing the Councilors to pause in their tracks, probably shocked by how respectful he was being since he still called the Hokage "Old Man". "Uchiha Sasuke would like to respectfully request a spar in order to gain some of the wisdom you have earned through your valuable experience."

"Request granted." Koharu replied with a slightly sadistic smile that scared the hell out of him after a brief conversation with her fellow council members.

Based on the slight and rather arrogant smirk Sasuke gave after he'd gotten over his surprise at being volunteered for a spar with one of the Councilmembers, the boy wasn't going to be taking this seriously. More's the pity for him. He was getting along better with the other boy but, that didn't mean that Sasuke didn't grate on his nerves and bug the hell out of him. And, seeing him learn the sort of lesson that Koharu was about to teach...

The spar looked just as painful as he expected a spar between a Rookie Genin and a war veteran who had fought on the front lines and came back with all of their limbs intact would be. Koharu had been on the front lines during the first two Shinobi World Wars and lived to tell the tale, so naturally, despite the fact that age and inactivity were catching up to her, she was beyond tough.

Sasuke had opened with his usual stance that was a cross between the standard Academy form and something else that had probably been taught to him back when his clan was still alive. Koharu took a stance that he didn't recognize, which had very few if any holes in it, with any hole he may spot more likely being a trap than an actual hole in her defense. Both of them stood waiting for the other to make the first move, until Sasuke finally lost his patience and opened with a high kick which was promptly blocked before Sasuke was swiftly and brutally smacked down. Koharu, despite the fact that age had put some weight on her, still kept herself in something approaching fighting shape. This was to be expected considering the fact that one of her side hobbies was training her grandchildren.

Sasuke apparently hadn't learned his lesson, or the one Tetsuo-sensei had tried to teach him about not letting anger get the best of him, as he sprung up and flew at Koharu in a rage. This was the wrong move to make, and only resulted in Sasuke getting smacked down again and again without even once landing a blow on the Council member until Koharu had called an end to the spar and thanked Sasuke for the light workout. As he watched Sasuke watch the female member of Team Tobirama leave, Naruto kenw that the furious glint in Sasuke's eyes as he watched the Councilmember depart meant trouble

"There's a reason that the Councilmembers still hold the rank of Jounin, and it doesn't have anything to do with any honorary bullshit either." he said to his teammate who looked to be about to blame him for his humiliating defeat. "The reason none of them are Hokage is because the Old Man still has the hat. Any one of them could give Uchiha Itachi a tough time if they didn't outright kill him if he ever chose to go against them."

Sasuke turned and gave him a sharp and surprised look at that last statement. Mentioning Itachi was always a surefire way to get the boy's attention. He'd been sure to do it sparingly though, in order to not desensitize the boy to the mentioning of his brother's name.

"What did you expect would happen?" he asked with a shrug as he walked away from his defeated teammate who probably wouldn't absorb the lesson that Koharu had taken the trouble and time out of her busy day to teach. "The Old Man and his Councilors have been ninja for over sixty years. They've forgotten more things about being a shinobi than most ninja learn during a lifetime."

* * *

Sakura sighed as she packed her bag according to Academy guidelines, this time being sure to leave out any cosmetics or other frills that would just add unneeded weight. She didn't want a repeat of the incident at the beginning of her Genin career three weeks ago. Even though she knew that being a shinobi would be far tougher than her romantic dreams had led her to believe, she still liked to have at least some creature comforts, and she wouldn't be able to have any of those comforts if she couldn't carry them with her.

As she packed, the silence of her new apartment unsettled her. She wondered how Naruto was able to stand it. She hadn't spent more than an hour in her new apartment, and she was already going up the wall. She was so used to the distant sounds of her mother puttering about downstairs that not hearing them disturbed her. The decided lack of sounds from her nearest neighbors and the people who wandered through the outside street in the much busier district in which her former home was located which disturbed her as well. The silence seemed to be creeping in from every corner, and pressing down on her.

She had made her decision though and, as her father had pointed out the night before as he helped her pack her belongings, she would be forced to live with it. Her father had promised to visit as often as he could but, she knew that with work and all, that wouldn't be all that often, which meant that she would be left her alone in the silence for long stretches of time. Fortunately for her sanity at the moment, she would be getting out of here soon, and would be spending time in company for a few weeks. She wasn't too sure what she felt about the people she'd be spending the next few weeks with, but at least she wouldn't be left alone in silence.

Her mother, whom she was still very mad at, had been rather upset to discover that she was leaving again so soon. Even though she wasn't all that happy about the fact that she was going to be leaving the village after she'd just got back herself, she at least understood that there was nothing she could do about it since the team had made a number of prior commitments that they couldn't break. She just hoped that her mother would snap out of her Extreme Mode soon. The way she was going, she was going to say something that pissed off the wrong person, and there'd be a good chance that she wouldn't be there when she got back.

**Edited 10-6-12**


	31. Bouncing Around

The team was back on the road, and quite unhappy with the pace that had been set in order to rendezvous with the caravan they were supposed to be escorting to Tanigakure in time. Had their trip not been cut short due to the Snafu in Saida, they would have taken a far more leisurely pace in order to meet the caravan that was leaving from a trading town which was a bit to the South-East of Kusagakure and only just located inside Fire Country than the one they were currently taking in order to make sure they got there in time to help with the final checks prior to departure. The fact that Sasuke and Sakura were not yet accustomed to traveling through the treetop highway slowed them down considerably and added several days to their journey since they had to take established ground roads to get to their destination.

After the team left the caravan in Tanigakure either on the last day of November or the first of December, they would have to run back to the border between Fire and River for a week of patrol at one of the more isolated River Country border crossings before they ran across River Country and into Wind Country where they would be employed on one of the regular Winter sweeps for bandits along the Wind Country border. The mission in Wind Country had originally been arranged to give the team experience with working with foreign shinobi on a joint mission but, that was something they already had thanks to that screw up in Saida that had led to them assisting the forces of the rogue ninja Momochi Zabuza on a mission that was way above the Genin's pay grade.

As the team ran towards the small border trading town, there was a chill in the air that made it obvious that November would be coming to an end relatively soon, and that Winter was fast approaching.

* * *

Hibachi nervously tapped his pen against his desk as he tried to remember the answer to the question on the history test in front of him. He and his former classmates, as well as the three years above them had until January when school let back in for the Fall Cycle students and all of the teachers would be occupied with the current Academy students to cram in six years of study, and learn all of the things they should have learned during their first runthrough of the Academy but hadn't for some reason. If they succeeded, all of them who had previously failed would have one more chance to become ninja, which meant that this was his last chance to make his father proud of him before he got stuck back in the Civilian school that he'd been enrolled in after he'd failed his final teamwork test the last time.

Ami, who had been pulled out of some all girl's school near the Capitol for this, looked almost as nervous as he felt. He felt an upsurge of satisfaction at this. He still hadn't forgiven her for what she did to him during the teamwork test in front of the Jounin who could have been their sensei if they hadn't screwed up. Hopefully, his scores on his final test at the beginning of January would change what team he ended up on because, in his book, if he ever saw Ami again after this, it would be too soon.

The history book that he was currently being tested out of had been quite a revelation, especially when he'd tried to read between the lines the way his father had taught him. Apparently, the story about the publisher of the old textbooks having been in the pay of a foreign village was true, and the man had indeed bribed one of the Hokage's secretaries to forge the Hokage's approval for the editions he produced. That was the only explanation he could find for why the new textbooks were so wildly different from the old ones. The new textbooks that his father had told him looked very much like the textbooks that he'd learned out of when he was a kid.

The old publisher had apparently hated the Uzumaki for some strange reason. Either that, or the new publisher was an Uzumaki. In the old book, the Uzumaki name hadn't appeared once and Uzushiogakure had never been mentioned. In just about every chapter of the new history book however, either an Uzumaki or Uzushiogakure would be mentioned somewhere. The Shodai Hokage's wife? Uzumaki. Konoha's ally during the First Shinobi World War? Uzushiogakure who sent a battalion of Uzumaki to reinforce the Nidaime's forces. Konoha's ally for most of the Second War until it was overrun by Kumo, Kiri, and Iwa? You guessed it...

It made you wonder why the adults hated Naruto so much considering how important his family had been, and everything they'd done for Konoha.

The teacher's announcement that they had ten minutes violently pulled him out of his musing as he frantically turned to the test, deciding to skip that question and answer the next one. The answer to that one was of course, Uzumaki.

* * *

Suzume felt like screaming. That was the second time she'd run into that white-haired pervert while she wasn't fully dressed. A month ago, when she and Yamanaka Eri, who was currently running border patrol near Ame, had decided to stop at an onsen on their way home from an escort mission, the white-haired bastard had completely ruined her bath.

This time, she had been changing, and had seen a glint in the distance. Figuring that it might be a poacher, she'd hopped into a nearby tree and pulled out her field glasses in order to investigate. What she saw when she looked through the binoculars was a certain white-haired pervert who was putting a telescope away and pulling out a notebook. If that white-haired pervert was who she thought he was rather than an impostor, there was a good chance that she would be appearing in the next book in the Icha Icha series since she couldn't go over there and shove that damn notebook up the Sannin's ass because he was just outside the borders of the nature preserve she was supposed to be patrolling.

As soon as she wasn't stuck playing park ranger, she would be tracking that pervert down and giving him a piece of her mind with her fists, Legendary Sannin or no.

* * *

Konohamaru sighed as he made his way up to the small rooftop greenhouse where the boss kept most of his plants. The boss's former teammate Satoshi had to go on a mission so, he'd handed him the boss' keys and asked him to water his plants until either he or Naruto got back. He'd agreed to do so because, he knew that Naruto would be sad if he found his plants dead when he returned sometime in late December.

When Naruto had gotten back before he turned around and left again, he may as well as been gone, since he hadn't really had any time to spend with him when he'd returned for about thirty hours or so after being gone for three weeks. First, he'd had to spend a bunch of time being debriefed about a mission that had gone wrong, then he'd had to unpack his apartment. The next day, he'd had to meet with the Council, re-pack his apartment, and leave again.

It sucked while Naruto was away. Things had gotten boring rather quickly after he'd left since he didn't really have anyone to play with, and nobody to teach him aside from boring old Ebisu. Even having Naruto around when he was going through one of his bad days was better than not having him around. Without Naruto around, he hadn't really had any adventures.

When Naruto was there, there was almost always something interesting going on, like back when they'd played veterinarian and snuck onto the Nara property to watch how baby deer were born, or the time they'd played ninja on the Library roof and got chased off by an angry librarian. Naruto had taught him how to climb trees, set traps, and set bones. Not every lesson Naruto had taught him had been fun or even nice but, there was one thing the lessons never were, and that was boring.

* * *

Sanbashi Mizuko sat in his favorite watering hole in Kiri eagerly listening to the account that a merchant from Hot Water Country was relating to the entire bar. Apparently, Momochi Zabuza and a group of ten ninja had gone into that country, raided the base of a criminal organization that had hired more than a hundred missing-nin, and slaughtered every last one of them. The most amazing thing about the story was the fact that four of the ten ninja who had accompanied the rogue swordsman had been children who were no older than thirteen.

He had been inclined to disbelieve the story right up until the merchant had mentioned a description of one of the children who had participated that was based on the eye-witness account of one of the survivors of the massacre, one of the children who had been spared that night as all the adults had been slaughtered. According to the child, one of the ninja that had taken part in the killing had been a blond boy who had lines on his cheeks.

It would seem that Uzumaki Naruto had been getting around.

Apparently, Konoha hadn't wanted any rogue wanna-be ninja villages anywhere near their borders. Hiring Zabuza, whose reputation preceded him, in order to draw attention away from their involvement in the incident had been a stroke of pure genius. Since nobody even seemed to realize that Konoha had been involved because Zabuza's name had gotten itself attached to the operation, Konoha would be able to keep their goody two-shoes reputation for a while longer.

* * *

Naruto sneezed as he helped set up camp. He'd been doing that alot lately, and if he had ever been sick a day of his life, he might've thought that he was coming down with a cold. Since he hadn't, he just figured that it was just one more of those weird and inexplicable things that tended to happen to him. Shrugging it off, he went back to gathering kindling for the fire. As he reached for a stick that he'd noticed lying near a log, he felt a sharp pain in his wrist. Looking down, he found that the reason his wrist was hurting was because a snake had buried its fangs in it.

"Aw crap, not again!" he yelled as the snake disengaged and rather swiftly started slithering away.

The two puncture marks were completely healed by the time he started to feel nauseous. Fortunately, he managed to make it back to camp before he started puking his guts up. The cramps had already started setting in by the time anyone realized that something was wrong.

Considering what had happened the last time he'd gotten bitten by one of those things, tonight was going to be hell.


	32. Caravan Surprise

Naruto was rather embarrassed to find himself being carried for the two days following the snakebite. He could walk fine after the first day despite the fact that he'd still been feeling queasy but, Tetsuo-sensei tended to be slightly overprotective of him after he got into such situations as the snakebite and hadn't allowed him to do so. Fortunately for his reputation, Tetsuo-sensei had let him down before they had reached the small trading outpost from which the caravan they would be escorting would be departing. Since the place was little more than a watering hole for the animals who pulled the traders' carts that was surrounded by a few houses and a couple of shops that sold a few items that the merchants might have forgotten to bring with them and a small discreetly placed brothel, there had been little need to run around and explore, and potentially risk another day of being carried.

The night of the snakebite had been exceedingly miserable, and there had been several points during it that he'd wished that he would have died in under an hour like a normal person. He had been feverish and vomiting constantly for that entire night. By midnight that night, he had run out of things to puke up, even bile, and had dry heaved for the next several hours. But fortunately, by dawn the following morning, the fever had broke and the heaves began to subside. Throughout the following day, the fever, which had most likely been caused by the Kyuubi's Chakra burning through his system in order to remove the poison, had subsided and the queasiness had slowly vanished until both were finally gone completely by sundown. Of course, that hadn't stopped Tetsuo-sensei from carrying him for the entire day after that until they'd reached the trading outpost.

His situational awareness had improved greatly over they years but, it still wasn't perfect, and he was almost willing to swear that that damn snake that had bit him and its ilk were invisible, their camouflage was so good. That, and he had a potentially lethal tendency to ignore breathing things that looked like they belonged such as squirrels, mice, and lizards when he was on the lookout for traps, which could be an exceedingly dangerous oversight considering the number of summons and other animals ninja often used. But, if he treated every creature in the vicinity as a threat, he would end up becoming a paranoid wreck, which would make him worse than useless in the long run. Fortunately, thanks to the Kyuubi and his own dumb luck, he'd survived this incident like he had the others, and he was well enough to complete the mission and contribute to the protection of the caravan that he and his team would be traveling with when the time came.

The caravan they would be escorting to Tanigakure was going to be made up of several much smaller caravans from several countries, including the Land of Iron and the Land of Tea, hence the somewhat isolated meeting place, and the rather slow travel time, as it would take a while for the separate groups and whatever new employees they picked up in town to get into synch and adapt to the new routine. Such caravans were ideal for new Genin who were starting out, as the longer travel time got the young ninja accustomed to life on the road in such a setting, and the bandits who attacked caravans knew that the larger ones tended to be better guarded thanks to the training opportunities they provided. That didn't mean that such caravans were never attacked by bandits however, hence the hiring of ninjas for escort duty, as most bandits had at least a little ninja training that they'd picked up from somewhere which tended to make them overconfident and occasionally lucky.

The path that the caravan would be following was one that would navigate through the safer byways of the Fire Country borderlands where two more merchants would be picked up in a pair of small towns - one of which was known for its textiles and the other of which was popular for its pottery - before the caravan took a sharp turn into River Country and made its way into Tanigakure with its shipment of goods. Because most of this trip would be through Fire Country it had made sense to the caravan leaders to hire Konoha ninja despite the caravan's eventual destination. Naturally, this choice would create some friction when they arrived in Tani but, that couldn't be helped. All they could do about that however was do their best to stay out of trouble, and get out of the Village Hidden in the Valleys as quickly as possible after confirmation of mission completion was received.

As the caravan prepared to get underway, Shimura Tetsuo looked as if he were waiting for the other shoe to drop. While it was possible that the snakebite had appeased whatever curse Naruto was apparently under, it was clear that he was almost certain that such a minor mishap wouldn't be enough of a disaster even considering the fact that had that snake bitten someone else they would've most assuredly died. Wood vipers, though rare, were exceedingly deadly.

For a while, nothing of note happened, and then one day Naruto ran into the elderly red-haired ox-cart driver while wandering amongst the carts of the caravan. Whether or not this would be considered a good thing was up for debate. While on the one hand, Naruto had gotten to meet and learn from a relative, on the other, Naruto had met and learned from a relative. Back when the Uzumaki were still a force to be reckoned with, "Work hard, play harder." could have been the unofficial Uzumaki family motto. Perhaps, the only reason Uzushiogakure had stood as long as it had with the Uzumaki in residence had been the seals that the Uzumaki were famous for. Of course, those self-same seals had caused most of the continent to fear them enough that three of the five largest hidden villages had banded together to destroy the village and scatter the Uzumaki to the winds.

* * *

"Are you sure you're not a Senju?" Uzumaki Hiroki laughingly asked his young cousin as he watched the boy struggle to make a basic water-holding seal for his canteen.

Hiroki wasn't the best person to teach the boy for several reasons but, he was pretty much the only one who could teach him at the moment since there weren't any other Uzumaki in the caravan, and they weren't likely to run into any during the trip. Unlike the child who reminded him of the younger brother he'd left behind when he'd left home, he was not and never had been a ninja. He was an old man who had gone wandering in his long-ago youth back before the fall of Uzushiogakure and had remained on the road since.

Because he'd never been a ninja, aside from his odd and - for him - basically useless talent, he pretty much only knew the basics of his clan art, and most of the seals he knew how to make and put together had been learned through obsessive practice and rote memorization. As he had chosen not to become a shinobi, his few talents in sealing weren't geared towards combat, because his studies been more focused on the softer side of the art during his short period of interest in it before he'd set out for life on the road.

"Yes, I'm sure I'm not a Senju!" the boy growled as he tried the seal once more.

One more failure, and the boy would be needing a new canteen. Considering the amount of Chakra he was putting into his efforts, the child was already lucky that the canteen hadn't crumpled, imploded, or exploded into hundreds of pieces of lethal shrapnel that would either maim or kill anyone in their path. Sealing could be an exceedingly deadly art as well as a useful one, and failed seals could be the deadliest of all. One of the largest causes of death amongst the Uzumaki aside from death in combat had been Seal failure. One of the most common causes of Seal failure had been experimentation with untested seals. He himself had lost two close cousins to seal experiments before he left.

Most of the time, when a seal failed, nothing would happen but sometimes...

The boy who resembled his Uzumaki kin in more than just looks had been almost uninterested in seals until he had offered to teach him. Apparently, aside from storage seals, the boy had lost interest for the most part due to the combination of a lack of talent and a lack of proper instruction. Aside from some rather excellent storage seals that had been mastered through constant practice, and some explosive seals that had been mastered through a similar method, the boy had almost no skill in the area. Not all Uzumaki possessed the innovative talent in that field that had made the clan famous however. Many Uzumaki had gotten by on seals that they had learned through rote memorization like Naruto appeared would have to.

Since he had learned how to create seals through rote memorization himself, he knew what Naruto would be going through if he didn't give up here and now. Because of that, he decided to show Naruto what he could achieve through practice if he tried often and hard enough. Going to the back of his cart, he pulled out what he considered to be his best sealing project to date, a portable mini-fridge that didn't depend on electricity. Of course, one of the main methods of electricity generation for cities - especially in the Hidden Villages - was seals, but still...

"Why don't you take a break and come have a look at this?" he said as he brought out the light mini-fridge that he usually used for beer storage.

"Wow." Naruto said as he examined the box into which a number of intricate seals had been carved. "That's a neat puzzle box."

"Puzzle box?" he asked in confusion.

It was at that point that the boy did something unexpected, and frankly exceedingly annoying considering how much work he'd put into the mini-fridge. The brat deconstructed every last one of the seals on the thing while he stood there watching in disbelief. While the Uzumaki were well known for their seals and Seal Masters had been rather thick on the ground while the Uzumaki had been alive, there was one type of Uzumaki who appeared once or twice a generation at most, the same type of Uzumaki he was. Like him, Naruto could pop seals apart and get into whatever they were meant to protect as if they were never there.

While he would be able to learn to make them and make them work together by rote, the Naruto boy would never become a master at creating seals. No natural seal breakers ever were.

* * *

Danzo smiled slightly as he looked over the latest progress reports on the program that was running at the Academy. Based on the numbers, it looked that Konoha would be scrabbling to find enough Jounin who could be pulled off of their missions without seriously depleting Konoha's available numbers of such to instruct the new batch of ninja that would be graduating in January.

Two Genin level civilians that could be called up in dire emergencies for each active shinobi would normally be good numbers but, the number of active shinobi had seriously been slipping over the past three decades, creating a serious need for more active shinobi to cover both the missions that the village had been receiving as well as home defense. For the next several years, the numbers would have to be reversed in order to bring the level of Konoha's forces up to where it should be. Based on the reports he was reading, it looked like those numbers would be met, at least for this year.

Hiruzen had caught the crisis before it destroyed Konoha, reaffirming at least some of his faith in the other man. That faith had been steadily diminishing over the last few decades, and had almost completely vanished within the most recent one. Seeing how quickly Konoha was turning around now that Hiruzen was aware of and paying attention to the problem, he was beginning to see the boy and later young man that he had chased after and striven to equal once more.

After the way the last few years had gone, he had been starting to think that Biwako had been the brains behind the operation.

**Edited 1-15-13**


	33. Dire and Not So Dire Happenings

While the Caravan that Naruto and his team were protecting wended its way towards Tanigakure, the town of Saida was dealing with a crisis that many were coming to believe they wouldn't survive. On the day the Daimyo's men had come to arrest Futuro Kinmaru, the merchant's mercenaries arrived to deal with the town as per his orders. There had been a brief battle in which the Daimyo's men who had been part of the Fire Country Judicial Forces rather than ninja had been killed and the village overrun. Instead of fleeing like a sensible fugitive would following the murder of several of the Daimyo's men, Kinmaru who proved to be a madman as well as a criminal stayed, believing that the town was too small and remote for anyone of importance to bother dealing with.

Following Kinmaru's takeover, the townspeople of Saida were living in fear as the merchant who had taken their town ruled over them with an iron fist and severely punished those who didn't show him the "proper respect". The only hope the townspeople had now was that a small boy that had slipped past the mercenary patrols would reach Konoha, and that the ninja there would be inclined to help them despite the treatment they had received at the townspeople's hands the last time they had been through. As the villagers waited and hoped, more and more of them were dragged out into the town square to be "punished" as Kinmaru sat watching in his throne-like chair whilst snacking on delicacies and a group of jeering mercenaries laughed.

Every time a defiant Saida resident mentioned Konoha or the ninja whom they'd treated poorly at the merchant's urging, they received scoffs in return. After all, wasn't it they who had banded together and chased a team from Konoha from their town? Even if Konoha was inclined to help due to their bleeding-heart nature, it wouldn't do much good. It was a well known fact that despite strong numbers and a few well-known figures, Konoha was weak, was preparing to stand down its forces and become a tourist trap like Yugakure had done. The only reason nobody had invaded yet aside from the mutual defense treaty with Suna was the fact that Konoha had been riding on its old reputation, and nobody was entirely certain whether or not the village was only playing dead.

On the day the caravan reached Tanigakure and Sakura had somehow found herself in a fight with one of the locals, a small boy named Hiro stood at the gates of Konoha wondering how he'd be able to get help from the ninja who lived there. Prior to now, he'd only heard stories about Konoha, stories that had painted it as a mystical place whose residents practiced esoteric arts that were unknown to the minds of normal hard-working men. Unfortunately, none of those stories had told him where or how to get help for his friends and family. The only thing he could think of doing was to ask the Hokage who stood ruler over all of Konoha which was far bigger than any other town or village he'd ever seen.

"Hey kid, what're you doing?" one of the gate guards who'd apparently noticed he'd been standing staring at the massive village gate for too long asked.

"I-I need to see the Hokage." Hiro stammered nervously, remembering what he'd heard that the ninja had done to the men who had dared to kidnap some of their own.

"I swear, if this is yet another brat who's run away from home to become a ninja, I'm taking him to Danzo." the other gate guard said before flagging down a passing Chunin.

Once the Chunin who'd previously been taking advantage of his sick leave was settled in the second guard's former position, the gate guard led the boy further into the massive "village" that rivaled the Capitol in size, scope, and grandeur despite the fact that it was centuries newer. Eventually, the two of them reached the massive administrative complex that was the heart of the village. Once there, Hiro was practically dragged to the Mission Assignment room because he couldn't help but stop and stare despite the urgency of his mission, having seen nothing like this place before in his short life.

Standing at the back of the room behind the Mission Assignment Desk was an old man in red and white robes who wore a red and white hat that bore the Kanji for Fire. This was clearly the Hokage whose ninja would be able to help his village.

"There," the gate guard who'd led him from the gate said. "You've seen the Hokage, and as you can see he's a very busy man who doesn't have time for..."

But, Hiro wasn't listening, he was doing what was probably the stupidest thing that one could do in the Hokage's presence, which was approaching the Hokage without permission. Had the elderly man who had a soft spot for children not gestured for the guards to stand down, the boy would have been dead before he had gotten within ten feet of the man, much less close enough to kneel at the man's feet.

"Please." Hiro said as he knelt before the Hokage in supplication. "I need your help."

"What with?" the Hokage asked with a put upon sigh. He received similar pleas from more important people nearly every week, and almost every request made after the initial pleading turned out to be exceedingly trivial and not worth the time or the resources needed to fulfill the request. Getting a child to do the begging was a rather novel move however.

"We arrested this evil merchant who was selling people as slaves, and when the Daimyo's men came to take him to the Capitol to be tried, the merchant's men came and killed them and took over the town. We need your help to get rid of them." Hiro replied, hoping that if he didn't mention what they'd done to the ninja who'd rescued the merchant's children, the Hokage would be more inclined to help.

"There's something you're hiding." the Hokage said, noting that the child showed all the classic signs. He would have dismissed the boy's begging as a stupid and suicidal prank if he hadn't received a missive that morning from the Daimyo who'd requested that a team of ninjas go out and search for some of his men who'd been engaged in a prisoner transfer from a town on the Hot Water Country border and were several days late.

"We didn't mean to!" the boy replied in a rather guilty tone that the Hokage recognized from the days when he'd been raising his children.

"What didn't you mean to do?" the Hokage asked.

"If we'd known that the merchant was lying about your ninja being with the kidnappers, we wouldn't have been rude to them, and we wouldn't have tried to chase them off." the boy replied somewhat sulkily.

The Hokage sighed for an entirely different reason than he had earlier after recalling the incident the boy had mentioned. On the one hand, things in Saida couldn't have turned out better if he'd planned it because, he wouldn't have to send in operatives to covertly deal with the leaders of that little Snafu over the period of several months to a couple of years. On the other, things couldn't be worse. Instead of sending out a single team to search for the remains of the party which he had previously believed had run afoul of bandits, he would be forced to send several teams out into open combat with little hope of remuneration as everything of value had most likely already have been long since been taken from the Saida townspeople, and the Daimyo would more than likely mark the mission down as one of the ones Konoha owed him each year in order to be allowed to keep operating within Fire Country's borders. Normally, Konoha got away with a bunch of cat retrieval missions and a couple of C-ranks, but...

"Don't worry child." he said with one of the smiles that had been formulated to put small children at ease. "We'll still help you despite what you were tricked into doing to our ninja. Sometimes even the smartest people get tricked."

Mentally marking the rescue of the township of Saida down as one of those crappy no-pay to low-pay missions that bolstered Konoha's image as "the nice guys" that they'd been taking on in increasing numbers over the years, the Hokage deftly deflected the small boy's exuberant display of gratitude, and ordered one of the guards to take the boy to get something to eat. Considering the situation the boy had described and the likely reaction the merchant would have to being deposed from his ill-gotten post by ninja, this was likely to be the last time that boy would be happy for a long time. There was a good chance that the child was already an orphan and, until it was proven otherwise, he would recommend that the child be housed in one of the village orphanages.

As far as he was concerned, the situation sucked for everyone all round. The ninja being sent to Saida would be receiving the lowest pay for that rank of mission out of the village's infrastructure funds which would take money away from road repair and park maintenance unless other remuneration was received. He of course would have to justify his reasoning for assigning such a mission, as the number of missions gained from slightly squeamish travelers who would hire "the ninja who dealt with bandits without making it rain guts" wouldn't come close to making up for the ninja who would be lost in that mission. Most of all, it sucked for the Saida townspeople who would be hostages in a few short days when the mission was underway.

* * *

Across the village and completely oblivious to the crisis that was brewing half-way across the country, Mitokado Homura's heart pounded in a way it hadn't in years. Certainly not since his beloved wife had passed on at far too young an age when their last child who had soon followed her - a child that had been completely unexpected considering the fact that she should have been going through menopause at the time - had been born too soon. Fidgeting nervously, he once again examined the flowers he'd brought with him before knocking on the door.

His heart hammered even harder in his chest as he heard coming from within the house the shuffling of a pair of dainty feet that had once sent a Kumo ninja flying over a tree before their owner had left the ninja forces in order to marry a good man who - at the time - he'd been upset wasn't him and start a family. Before he was ready, the door opened and a familiar face appeared. Age and arthritis may have caught up with Hitomi-chan, but she was still as beautiful to his eyes as she had been in her youth.

"I'd ask if Sarutobi made you fetch my groceries for me again but, I haven't asked for any recently." Hitomi said when she spotted him on her doorstep, her beautiful brown eyes lit up with amusement.

"I uh, I uh Icametogiveyouthese!" Homura squeaked as he thrust the flowers in Hitomi's face.

Even at sixty-eight, she could make him feel and act like a nervous first-year Academy student...


	34. Honesty

Naruto sighed as the team settled into their night's camp. A few days on, and Sakura's eye was still a spectacular shade of purple and Sakura's lip was still swollen. She apparently didn't heal nearly as fast as he did, and if those wounds didn't heal without a trace by the time they got back to Konoha, there was no telling what the girl's mother would do. The woman had gone absolutely insane when Sakura had shown up back home with a couple of scratches and a scrape or two.

Nobody knew exactly who had started that fight between Sakura and the Tanigakure ninja that had resulted in those injuries but, - while they had been there - all of the ninja of that village - few though they were - had looked as if they were spoiling for a fight. None of them had been happy that Konoha ninja had been hired to guard that caravan, considering the fact that its final destination before it split apart and each part of it went their own way was their village. One would think that the fight that would have eventually broken out considering how much the Tani ninja seemed to want one would have involved the Jounin rather than Sakura, but that had not been the case. The adults of the village had had the patience and control that came from more than a decade of training. Training that the Genin had lacked.

After pulling the pair of kunoichi apart, Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei had hustled them out of the village as quickly as they could without making it seem as if they were fleeing. If it appeared that they were fleeing, it would make them look guilty, and they would attract the negative attention of the villagers who would promptly take the other kunoichi's side in the matter which they would still be likely to do anyway even if she was in the wrong because she was one of theirs. That negative attention they would've received had they appeared to be leaving with a little more haste than was called for might have taken the form of a mob which was something they wouldn't want because a Tanigakure mob would be more organized and better armed than the one that had seen them off from Saida.

As they crossed River Country on their way back to the border, Sasuke and Sakura got a bit of practice in tree-hopping. Once Sakura finally got over her fear of falling, she took to it like a fish to water. Sasuke, who'd only just mastered the tree-climbing technique to Tetsuo-sensei's satisfaction, was a bit more frustrated by the technique, but managed to pick it up without mishap. Thanks to Sasuke and Sakura's mastery of tree-hopping, the trip back to the Fire Country border was much quicker than the trip out had been, and as soon as they reached the border, they ran to the rendezvous point where they met and relieved the team that had been patrolling the border before them. The team of teenage Chunin were rather relieved to be going home because things had gotten rather cold, and the Winter rain was due to start soon. While the Chunin would be cozy in their nice warm beds and Ito's mother's basement where a rec room had been set up, they would be out in it.

The team's first day of border patrol had gone rather well. Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei had showed them several signs of a border incursion that they should be on the lookout for as they slowly moved along the border between Fire and River. Many of the signs that Kakashi and Tetsuo-sensei had created and displayed were near invisible and rather innocuous on the surface. Should they see genuine versions of any such signs during their patrols, they should call for reinforcements, send word back to Konoha in case the team didn't survive the encounter, and attempt tracking.

After walking along the border for most of the day, getting a feel for the area and learning what to look out for, the team had finally stopped at a good spot that was out of the wind at around sunset and set up camp. Having set up camp so many times before, the team could practically do it in their sleep, which was one good thing to come out of the mess of the first trip the team had gone on. After getting a good nights sleep, they got back on the road, clearing up the camp in record time before taking on another day of patrol that was almost completely uneventful if one didn't count the team of Tanigakure ninja that had been shadowing them on the other side of the border. After a day of running parallel to the Tani team who were probably just waiting for an excuse to start something, they settled down a little way from the border in an area that was firmly in Fire territory where they were now setting up camp.

After they'd gotten tents set up rather than simply laying out on bedrolls like usual because it looked like rain or even a much rarer snow considering how cold it was, they decided that it might be safe enough to light a small relatively smokeless cookfire that evening. That fire was a small comfort to the group, and a source of envy to those who had to sit watch away from it with their back to it in order that what little light it shed wouldn't destroy their night vision. Much to Naruto's dismay, his watch was first, meaning that he would be getting a cold dinner later when Sasuke came to relieve him.

After admiring Sakura's shiner once more, he reluctantly turned to face the falling darkness hoping that no trouble would come to them in the night. He didn't hold out too much hope though, trouble almost always came to him eventually, especially when he was out of the village on what was supposed to be a "routine" C-ranked mission much like this one had been labeled as.

* * *

While Naruto was settling in for the first watch of the evening over on the River Country border, a different group of ninja were gathering near the border between Fire and Hot Water Country. Unlike Team Tetsuo however, this wasn't a border patrol force. Instead, it could almost be considered an invasion force despite the fact that what they were invading was within their own territory. This group of ninja who were all experienced career Chunin were part of a force that was surrounding Saida, preparing to go in two hours before dawn when the mercenaries who held the village captive were at their least alert.

Hidden in the woods that surrounded the town of Saida and the massive orchards that ringed the town were several teams of experienced ninja of which the group was one. Like most members of the force who had been sent to Saida, every member of this team was a veteran of the Third War and one was even a veteran of the Second. They, like the other teams, had been hand selected by the Hokage in order to minimize casualties. The less ninja that were lost in this mess, the better.

As they stood vigilantly waiting, hoping that the element of surprise wasn't blown and that this wouldn't turn into the bad sort of bloodbath when they went in, one of the operatives who had been sent in ahead of the mission to gather intel came to the group to provide a sitrep on conditions within the village. On this sort of mission where the entire continent would be dissecting their actions that night for a long time, it wouldn't do to accidentally kill a bunch of civilians and accidentally bypass a bunch of mercenaries who would then attack you the instant your back was turned.

Two minutes after the intel operative arrived, the group was standing around a rough map of the town they would be liberating early in the morning attempting to memorize the layout and points of interest. They weren't the team that would be sent in to capture the merchant and bring him before the Daimyo who would most likely have him publicly executed as a warning to others who might consider stealing sections of the outer reaches of his territory but, that didn't mean that their role in this was unimportant however. They would be one of several teams that would be helping to clear the way for that team and liberating the small town that merchant had taken over.

After planning for a while longer and getting a bit of food and a few hours of sleep so they would be alert when the time came, the time to move in came. Unlike the ninja battles most people pictured, having seen or heard of the titanic battles that took place between the strongest of ninja during times of war or other times of strife, the sort of battles that young ninja aspired to when they saw their first A-Ranked Jutsu at the Academy, there were no large explosions or fancy jutsu. They ran through the town silently, leaving death in their wake, killing mercenaries as they slept in their beds, on bedrolls, and drunkenly passed out in alleys.

They ran silent, deadly, and completely unseen. Rather than being customer pleasers who put on a show that was meant to impress and intimidate whoever may be watching, they were true ninja in every way that night.

Then, somewhere across town, someone screamed...

* * *

While ninja ran through the streets of Saida killing mercenaries left and right, Kisame and Itachi stood outside of Kumogakure after having rather swiftly completed the mission to which they had been assigned before Itachi had taken his little detour, and having finally had that long awaited talk that Itachi had been avoiding for nearly two weeks. They had talked for most of the evening after Itachi had finally given in and told him what he'd been avoiding telling him for years, and then a long silence had fallen, probably the longest silence in Kisame's entire life.

"So, let me get this straight." Kisame said, almost wishing he hadn't had that discussion with his partner. "Madara practically forced you to join the Akatsuki after he helped you kill your entire clan, which you did for Konoha to whom you are still loyal, and that the reason you killed the clan was to protect your little brother because they were all going to be executed for treason because they were planning a coup, and if someone else did it, your brother would have been killed as well?"

"That's pretty much sums it up, yes." Itachi replied in that same emotionless tone he almost always used, the same tone in which he'd narrated a tale of what could be considered treachery to the cause that he'd apparently never supported in the first place.

"You know, I think I liked it better when you were quiet about your past so you wouldn't have to lie to me." Kisame said as he started walking down the road they had been standing in the middle of when Itachi had finally given in and talked, unsure of what to think or feel about his partner who was still something approaching a friend at the moment.

Hey, at least Itachi was honest.


	35. In Sickness and Death

The clear sky over Konoha seems to mock them as they stand there in the cemetery watching as the coffins containing their comrades, their loved ones were interred. The arctic light of the late-Autumn sun seems to almost call Spring to mind, but holds none of the warmth that comes with the season of rebirth. It was just as well, considering that this was a funeral. Just as well that this day would come as the year died, as dark clouds gathered on the horizon, threatening to strip away the last of the blue from the sky much as the passing of the deceased had stripped the joy from the hearts of those who loved them.

Aside from the friends and the family of the deceased, only twelve other shinobi bothered to attend. In a village that boasts about ten thousand shinobi on its rolls - most of them Genin who've gone on to do other things until they are called up in an emergency or time of war - that seems surprisingly few to turn out for the deaths of three of their own, but the truth was that despite the fact that they'd kill to protect one of their own from an outsider be they foreigner or suicidal civilian the ninja forces weren't as tight knit as some would think, and most didn't see the point in turning out en masse to see the burial of a virtual stranger or three. Those of the acquaintances of the deceased who had been unable to come due to missions or other obligations would likely drop by and pay their respects in their own time.

No mission ever goes without a hitch of some sort, be it a stubbed toe on a D-Rank or the death of an entire team on an S-Rank, and the mess in Saida was no exception. The loss of only three of their number and ten of the Saida townsfolk not counting those who died before Konoha had gotten involved could be considered reasonably good, considering the way such missions often go. Trained fighters of any stripe will be able to spot when they were outclassed, and when someone who knows that they wouldn't be walking away from things alive was backed into a corner where they had available hostages at hand, things tended to get messy, much as they had done in Saida when the last knot of Mercenaries had been alerted to the attack by a screaming civilian.

Let it not be said that the Konoha shinobi hadn't given at least ten times as good as they got however. All of the mercenaries who had occupied the small border town of Saida at the time Konoha had attacked had been killed. Those who had fled had been hunted down and slaughtered over the next couple of days, and the merchant who'd hired them had been publicly executed just that morning as a warning to those who thought they might try something like that within the borders of the Fire Daimyo's lands in the future, and the fat man's head had been placed on a pike and put on display soon afterward. But, all of that was a cold comfort to those that had been left behind by the fallen.

Eventually, the coffins had been lowered into the graves and the bodies had been buried, and the last of the loved ones of the fallen had made their way back to continue their lives even though an integral part of them was missing. Hibachi, who had found himself staring at his father's grave until the clouds had finally swept in as they'd been threatening to do since morning and a freezing rain had started pouring down, was the last to leave.

At that point, he was just to numb to cry, though he knew that the tears would come again later. He'd always known that there was a chance that since he was a shinobi, his father could die in the line of duty, but he'd never really considered what that had truly meant until now. Before then, it had always been someone else's father, or uncle, or mother, or sister, or aunt, or brother who'd died. Now, it wasn't. Now it was his turn to look up every time the front door opened before realization hit and that closed look came upon his face, his turn to come out to the cemetery every day until duty pulled him away and he finally stopped coming, his turn to be "The boy whose father died while...", and the only thing he could think was that he wanted his father.

As he silently made his way home where his mother who'd not stopped crying since she'd received the news would undoubtedly have a cold meal waiting for him, he barely registered the fact that someone had approached him when he was still three blocks away from his house, and didn't bother to acknowledge this person's presence until they tapped him on the shoulder.

"What do you want?!" he snarled at Ami, whose presence was rather unwelcome at that moment.

"I-I just wanted to say how sorry I was that...that..." Ami stammered.

"Whatever, just go away." he said coldly, turning his back on the girl and storming onward towards the home his father would never return to. He didn't want or need Ami's pity, or anyone else's for that matter.

* * *

Being a medic of near-unparalleled skill, there were many things that Kabuto could do that most humans could not. If he received a blow that wasn't fatal, he could, if given time, regenerate from it. If poisoned, he could recover and so on and so forth. One thing he could not do however was cure the common cold.

As he stood there under the freezing rain in the northern reaches of Fire Country near the Sound border, he idly noted that the cough that had started a couple days before had settled into his chest and gotten worse, and that the current weather which looked like it would be staying indefinitely if past years were any indication wasn't helping. That couldn't be helped though, since he and his team of over-aged "Genin" who'd repeatedly been told that they should pack it in and give up already were on border patrol, and therefore he would not be able to get out of the rain for another week.

He would most definitely be having words with the man who ran the supply shop that he usually frequented, since the waterproof cloak he'd sold him clearly wasn't despite the fact that it had been marked as having been tested to the point where one could pretty much go swimming in the damn thing, shake it off, and have it be completely dry within five minutes. The reality when it came to the garment was nowhere near as advertised, seeing as it had become completely soaked through after three hours out in a steady downpour, and the clothing underneath fared no better. He was completely soaked to the skin, and wouldn't be able to dry off until he and his team made camp in another two hours.

As soon as his and his teammates' true loyalties were made known and they returned to Otogakure where they belonged for good, he was going to make damn sure that he never ran another border patrol mission again. There was a reason that the older shinobi left this assignment to the older Genin and newbie Chunin when they had the opportunity to do so after all.

As he ducked under what little shelter a nearby tree provided as his team took a break, and he coughed so hard he could barely breathe, Kabuto once again cursed the bastard who had gotten him sick. If he ever found out who was responsible for his current condition, he would kill them slowly and painfully.

* * *

Naruto nervously stepped over the border into Suna where he and his team would be taking a joint bandit clearing mission, half expecting he'd explode or something the instant he did so. Even Tetsuo-sensei was watching somewhat nervously as he stepped over the invisible line that separated the Land of Wind from the Land of Rivers, marking the absolute end of the border patrol mission that the team had taken. His and Tetsuo's nervousness as they made their way out of River Country and into Wind had practically been palpable, and it was making the rest of the team edgy. All three of the others found themselves sweeping for threats, and not relaxing as they found none, wondering what it was the other two had sensed that they could not.

The reason for Naruto and Tetsuo's state of nervousness was because the border patrol mission had been a completely routine one on which absolutely nothing had happened. Just about everything was poised to go wrong, what with the pissed off team of Tani ninja tailing them on their side of the border, and the rumors of a band of bandits being in the area, but despite all of that, absolutely nothing had happened aside from everyone getting rained on. Even as the team had made their run through the land of Rivers, passing several ninja teams as they skirted around Tanigakure, nothing happened. The Tani ninja had been positively well behaved, and had limited themselves to the occasional rude gesture whenever they came into view. Heck, they didn't even say a single goddamn word when Sasuke had decided to return several of their gestures with ones of his own that had been made in International so there would be absolutely no doubt as to what he was saying.

With all of that nothing, both Naruto and Tetsuo had found themselves growing increasingly tense as they waited for the first shoe to drop and squash them absolutely flat. The crossing into Wind country was completely uneventful however, as was the short trip to the rendezvous point where they would be meeting the team fron Suna that they'd be working with for the next several days.

When he first caught sight of them, Naruto thought that the Suna team that had been sent to work with them looked rather interesting. The teacher appeared to be missing an eye based on the way that half of his face was covered, the girl whose dark blonde hair was tied back into four ponytails carried a fan that marked her as either a Wind or a Fire user, the taller boy was wearing Kabuki makeup and dressed like a Bunraku puppeteer, and the third boy...

"Hey, are you an Uzumaki?" Naruto called over to the red haired boy who had a massive gourd strapped to his back.


	36. Failed Brinkmanship

Baki stared at the team that had come to help his team clear out a bandit nest. Apparently, the Kazekage's attempt at brinkmanship had backfired. In response to Gaara, Konoha had sent their own Jinchuriki. Up until the boy's debut at the Kirigakure Chunin Exams in which the child had torn a Genin team from Iwa apart, most of the nations had gone on blissfully unaware of exactly who Konoha's Jinchuriki was. Others had even believed the story that Konoha had put out that their Yondaime Hokage had actually destroyed the Kyuubi, and others still had posited that the Yondaime had merely dragged it into death with him as he'd reputedly summoned the Shinigami during the Kyuubi attack which had reputedly caused the destruction of a rather sizable section of Konoha.

In the years since the treaty between Suna and Konoha had been made, it had become increasingly apparent that it was an exceedingly one-sided deal, and it wasn't Suna who were reaping the benefits of the alliance that they'd made because they hadn't been strong enough to face a full scale war with Iwa on their own, especially since Kumo and sometimes Kiri tended to jump in on Iwa's side. Over the last decade and change since the end of the most recent war, Konoha had increasingly been receiving missions that should have gone to Suna. Case in point being this mission which could've been tended to by two Suna teams or even one in a pinch, and ended up being split between Suna and Konoha, meaning that Suna would only be receiving half the pay for this mission despite the fact that it was taking place within Wind Country's borders.

In the past year, there had been some rumblings of what looked like it might be a potential war to those who payed attention to the signs, but they seemed to be subsiding a bit. There had been increased invasion drills in which his team had participated over the last couple of months. That, and the Kazekage had ordered every Suna shinobi to get into fighting shape, and started calling up the Genin reserves in small batches each week despite the fact that there weren't any missions for them to take. Konoha had responded to this increased activity on their part by revamping their Academy curriculum and calling failed students back to the Academy, citing a traitor amongst the Academy teaching staff as the reason. The fact that this was happening now however couldn't possibly be a coincidence.

Considering Suna's move, and Konoha's counter move, Gaara had likely been placed on this mission in order to cause an incident of some sort in order to see how Konoha would react. If they followed the pattern they had been following, Konoha would roll over and take it like they had during that incident with Kumo and the Hyuuga and several incidents afterward. If that happened, they would know that they could go for Konoha's soft underbelly, since a few new books and a few new recruits wouldn't change how weak the village was at the top, nor how incompetent the current generation of Genin was. If Konoha didn't back down in the name of "peace" and demanded compensation for whatever injuries or deaths Gaara might cause however, they would have to carefully withdraw and adjust their plans accordingly.

If Konoha which had been doing everything they could to maintain peace didn't declare war on them that was.

That point was moot now however. Konoha had rather promptly given them their answer by rather pointedly reminding them that they had a Jinchuriki of their own. A Jinchuriki who would be able to survive whatever Gaara dished out and return it in spades if even a quarter of the rumors he'd heard about the boy were true. The boy possessed the strongest of the Biju after all.

As he stood there trying to figure out how the hell he was supposed to deal with a slightly over-sized team that had both Konoha's Jinchuriki and the Yondaime Hokage's former student on it - which, considering what that man's father had done to Suna's forces in the second war, was another firm statement that Konoha wouldn't be backing down this time - the Jinchuriki opened his mouth and yelled out a question that completely threw him for a loop. He knew that he didn't resemble the Uzumaki in the slightest, therefore the question had to have been directed at one of his students.

Was the boy seriously questioning the paternity of one of the Kazekage's children?

Quickly looking at where the Jinchuriki seemed to be focused, he realized that the boy had asked Gaara that question. Gaara, whose paternity had been called into question before, in spite of the boy's strong resemblance to his father, thanks to the red hair and the green eyes that were a mark of the Ichibi's possession.

This was not going to be good...

* * *

Gaara blinked, stared, blinked again and tried to reboot his brain. That was most definitely the strangest first reaction to his presence that anyone had had in living memory. Normally, there was a great deal more quivering in fear and hisses of "monster", sometimes even a bit of screaming as well. Of course, most people he ran into were in or from Suna, and the ones who weren't were almost always people he was in the process of killing as part of a mission, but still...

As he was trying to figure out how the hell to react to this, e.g. ignore it and the one who said it since he looked too weak to confirm his existence and Mother wasn't calling for his blood, or if he should kill the boy in case what he'd asked had been meant as an insult or something, Temari spoke up.

"Why the hell are you asking if my brother's an Uzumaki?" Temari yelled indignantly.

"Um, well, he's got red hair, and the old dude who's like my cousin or something has red hair, and my mother had red hair, and since the old dude and my mother were Uzumaki, I thought maybe he would be an Uzumaki too, and we'd be like cousins-ttebayo." the blond boy with the whisker markings on his cheeks who was wearing an outfit that was of various shades of muted oranges and browns said.

He blinked again as he wondered what the hell was going on in the blond boy's head. Whatever it was, aside from the fact that it was tangentially about him, it quite likely didn't concern him. Deciding to ignore the strange blond for the moment, he turned his attention to the rest of the team which, with five members, looked slightly unwieldy, too large to be a proper squad, and too small for anything else. Aside from the blond who'd been hoping he was a cousin, there were two Jounin, which was one Jounin too many for the group, there was a somewhat nervous pink haired girl, and there was a dark haired boy who had eyes that were somewhat familiar, eyes like his own but not.

As the dark haired boy turned, possibly to say something to the blond boy who'd quite likely ruined the team's first impression with his strange little outburst, he caught sight of the edge of a red and white clan sigil on his back.

**Uchiha! **Mother screamed in his mind. **Kill it! Kill it! KILL IT!**

He ignored his mother's screams for now, for the sake of the mission of nothing else, seeing as he didn't want to be a total disgrace to his village, and killing a member of a foreign team in front of said foreigners when it wasn't an objective of the mission would be an exceedingly stupid move that would bring embarrassment to Suna. He'd learned through experience that he could ignore Mother when she got like this for a little while, but eventually it got to be too much and he'd have to do something to sate her desires. Fortunately, people who were too stupid to live had a tendency to show up before things got too bad. If worst came to worst, he could do as Mother wished, but he would try to hold off on that for as long as possible.

"My name's Uzumaki Naruto, what's yours?" the blond boy asked him when the teams had finally come together and Baki and the two Konoha Jounin had gone off to trade notes.

"Gaara." he replied, barely paying attention to the blond, more focused on the dark haired boy who had caused Mother to have such a reaction.

"Nice to meet you Gaara." the blond boy said rather cheerfully.

He remained silent. He wasn't sure how to deal with this boy who was behaving so far outside what he considered to be normal, that normal couldn't be found with a telescope. The boy seemed to be reasonably nice, but that would more than likely end in trouble. The last time anyone had treated him with anything approaching true kindness had been his uncle Yashamaru, and he knew how that ended. It was entirely possible that his father had hired these Konoha ninja to take him out, and the blond one was meant to get him to drop his guard somehow.

If that were the case, the blond boy would die like all the rest who had tried before him.

* * *

Kakashi frowned when he caught sight of how the Jounin from Suna was looking at Naruto. This could potentially be trouble, especially considering how the man had tensed up when Naruto had approached the red-haired boy that he'd taken to be a possible Uzumaki.

Since Tetsuo was team leader for this mission, he had taken the lead in asking about the specifics of the mission and the plan they would have going in while he hung back and watched. He would continue to watch, since he had the feeling that something was not quite right about the situation, and it seemed to center around the red-haired boy who looked to be around Naruto's age.

If something happened to Naruto however, he would do much more than watch. Much, much, more. And, whether or not this Baki survived at the end of it would depend on exactly how strong the man was, and exactly how much more punishment his body could take in comparison to his own.

* * *

**Author's note**: For those wondering about my characterization of Gaara. In the subtitled version of Naruto, Gaara was reasonably calm and collected when his team showed up in Konoha for the Exams. That, and he called Kankuro out for causing potential embarrassment to Suna. As the days and weeks passed however... That, and Gaara had initially had an interest in Sasuke, and absolutely zero interest in Naruto.


End file.
